Brazil rolls out law boosting online protection of minors

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — A Brazilian law that seeks to shield minors from addictive, violent and pornographic online content took effect this week, with experts calling it a milestone in the protection of children and adolescents.

The issue gained traction in August, after influencer Felipe Bressanim, known as Felca, published a video denouncing the sexualization of children and adolescents online. The 50-minute video, which has 52 million views on YouTube, accelerated the approval of a bill that had been in the works since 2022.

The Digital Statute of Children and Adolescents passed both houses of Congress and was sanctioned by President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in September. It came into force on Tuesday.

Under the new law, minors under 16 are required to link their social media accounts to a legal guardian to ensure supervision. The legislation also prohibits platforms from using addictive features such as infinite scroll and the automatic play of videos. Digital services are also obliged to implement an effective age verification mechanism that goes beyond self-declaration that the user is over 18 to protect them from accessing inappropriate or prohibited material.

“We can no longer think that freedom doesn’t go hand in hand with protection,” said Lula during Wednesday’s signing ceremony. “Enough of tolerating exploitation, sexual abuse, child pornography, bullying, incitement to violence and self-harm just because it happens in the digital environment.”

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Maria Mello, head of the digital branch at the Alana Institute that defends the rights of children, said that manipulative design meant to keep people engaged is particularly harmful for children.

“It increases anxiety levels, pulls children out of school, causes vision problems,” Mello said. Other issues include sexual exploitation, encouragement of self-harm, cyberbullying and exploitation of children’s and adolescents’ personal data for commercial interests.

Brazil is the latest to join a group of governments around the world grappling with how to protect children online. In December, Australia implemented a world-first social media ban for children younger than 16, and earlier this month Indonesia announced a similar move starting this year.

Unlike an outright ban, Brazil’s law seeks to strengthen parental supervision, said Guilherme Klafke, a law professor at Getulio Vargas Foundation, a think-tank and university. The new framework, he said, “places more responsibility on those who offer digital products and services that may be accessed by children and adolescents.”

Lincoln Silva, a 48-year-old businessman who was picking up his two children aged 8 and 11 from school Thursday in Rio de Janeiro, welcomed the new legislation, saying it will reduce access to information that people shouldn’t have at a certain age. “There’s information we should only have in adulthood,” he said.

Tech companies have made a series of announcements to coincide with the new law. WhatsApp last week said it would introduce parent-managed accounts, allowing legal guardians to decide who can contact the child’s account and which groups it can participate in.

And Google said that in Brazil it would use artificial intelligence to estimate whether a user is a minor or adult in order to automatically block certain content. YouTube users under 16 years old will also need parental supervision to create or maintain a channel, the company added.

Companies that disregard the new law could face fines of up 50 million reais (approximately $9.5 million).

The new restrictions may create frustrations among young users, said Renata Tomaz, a communications professor at the Getulio Vargas Foundation. She said it was essential to dialogue with children to make sure they understand why the law was implemented.

“We need to convey all these points that we consider essential to protect children and adolescents in such a way that allows them to look at this law and say: ‘It’s good that I’m being protected.’”

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Diarlei Rodrigues and Mario Lobão contributed to this report.