Investigations into how various tech companies operate with minors are mounting in the United States. Meanwhile, Meta has lowered the age limit for Quest series headsets from 13 to 10.
A number of bills recently proposed in the US Congress include giving regulators sweeping powers and banning children under the age of 13 from social media entirely.
Company spokesperson Joe Osborne confirmed the new age limit to the tech site The Verge. Besides, he also showed a blog post about this news, which the company plans to publish soon.
The company says that parents will need permission to create children's accounts. And Meta will only 'recommend' apps that are safe for that age group. And children don't even have to watch ads to run it, Verge wrote in the report.
Perhaps most important are the meta profiles and avatars of 10- to 12-year-olds, which Quest uses in all of its apps. And it remains private by default. This means, users cannot follow their peers 'without parental permission'.
Only parents can turn off this protection feature, says the Metar blog post. And for now, only people above 13 years of age will get the experience of using the virtual platform 'Horizon Worlds'.
The reason behind Mater's decision is simple - reports The Verge. The company knows that children are interested in using VR headsets. And it would be better to give them relatively limited benefits instead of giving them the opportunity to enter through fake age, Verge wrote in the report.
The Verge reports that Meta wants to stay one step ahead of potential lawsuits and fines.
The FTC recently fined game developer Epic Games $520 million. "The company knew that many children were playing the Fortnite game," the agency found in its investigation. So Meta can now at least say that they have put in place alternatives for minors too, with the benefit of strict parental control.
While this is considered a good move by Meta, the issue is sensitive and could lead to a tougher letter from the US Senate.
