In 2021, Meta had rolled back ad targeting based on the “interests” and “activity” – a catch-all term for the trove of data the company collects about users’ internet activity – of teen users.

In its latest update, the company said that advertisers will  no longer be able to target teens based on in-app engagement, like Instagram and Facebook pages they follow and like.

“We recognise that teens aren’t necessarily as equipped as adults to make decisions about how their online data is used for advertising, particularly when it comes to showing them products available to purchase,” Meta said in a statement.

“We’re announcing further updates to our ad system beginning in February, including removing gender as an option for advertisers to reach teens. Additionally, their engagement on our apps — like following certain Instagram posts or Facebook pages —  won’t inform the types of ads they see,” the company added.

From March, Meta will also start offering teen users certain tools using which they can, to an extent, control the kind of ads they see. Teen users will be able to select topics they want to see fewer ads about. Topics include broad interests like makeup or celebrities. However, it is worth mentioning that there doesn’t appear to be a way to completely turn off ads about certain products or services.  The changes come as regulators across the world grapple with the issue of children and teens’ safety on the internet.

In India, the government has proposed to tighten the way social media companies and other internet firms serve ads to children. The draft Digital Personal Data Protection Bill, 2022, released by the Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY) last November, prohibits these platforms from tracking and behavioural monitoring of children, and from serving targeted ads.

In the US, the public school district in Seattle has filed a lawsuit against the tech giants  seeking to hold them accountable for the mental health crisis among youth. The lawsuit blames these platforms for worsening mental health and behavioural disorders including anxiety, depression, disordered eating and cyberbullying.

MeitY is also working on releasing the draft Digital India Bill, a revamped version of the Information Technology Act, 2000, which is currently India’s core legal framework for regulation of the Internet. The new Bill is expected to have a deep focus on online harms, among which it is considering adding cyberbullying of children as an offence, The Indian Express had earlier reported.

Earlier this month, the ministry also released draft amendments to the Information Technology Rules of 2021 to regulate online gaming, under which it said that a self regulatory body that will govern the space will have to evolve a framework that should include appropriate measures to be undertaken to safeguard children.