A little bit of historical context for the announcement by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology that they had launched a new research project “to boost the evidence base” on online harms.

“The first stage of the project will examine what methods will best help the government understand the impact of smartphones and social media use on children after a review by the UK Chief Medical Officer in 2019 found the evidence base around the links to children’s mental health were insufficient to provide strong conclusions.”

The report from the four UK CMOs in 2019 may have been inconclusive, but it was not without recommendations. In a parallel universe, had they been followed by the then Government in designing its legislation and by the tech sector in getting ahead of it, parents in 2024 might not be tearing their hair out about the impact of smartphones on their kids and the current Government might not be arguing with them about whether to ban them or not.

Firstly, the CMOs recommended a “duty of care” and an “imperative that the technology industry acts in the interests of users, as well as shareholders”. (Yes, it really is that simple.)

Secondly, the CMOs recommended that the precautionary principle should be followed - something William Perrin and Prof Lorna Woods had argued for in work on online harms at Carnegie UK earlier that year. The CMOs said:

“even though no causal effect is evident from existing research between screen-based activities, or the amount of time spent using screens, and any particular negative effect, it does not mean that there is no effect. It is still wise to take a precautionary approach.”

A series of “next steps” were presented for the tech sector, including establishing a “voluntary code of conduct”, ahead of legislation, to include:

• clear terms of use that children can understand
• enforcing their own Ts&Cs and to work with government to put in place effective age verification
• recognising the ‘precautionary approach’ in developing structures and remove addictive capabilities
• ensuring appropriate age-specific adverts only, focussing on help and where to access support
• ensuring that no normalisation of harmful behaviour (such as bullying and self-harming) occurs
• ongoing work about safety issues including, bullying and grooming.

It also said the tech sector “must share data they hold in an anonymised form with recognised and registered public sector researchers for ethically agreed research”.

The new review may well find that the evidence is still “insufficient to provide strong conclusions” on screentime and smartphones’ impacts on children’s mental health. But, as the CMOs set out so clearly five years ago, that doesn’t mean that there aren’t things the Government - and parents - can reasonably expect social media companies to do if they are serious about reducing risks to children and young people.