Momentum for age-appropriate design grows across Latin America

From Brazil and Argentina to Colombia and Mexico, 5Rights and partners are driving momentum for age-appropriate design across Latin America, urging policymakers to turn international best practices into enforceable law.

In the weeks following the entry into force of Brazil’s ECA Digital and as we mark the fifth anniversary of UNCRC General comment No. 25, 5Rights and partners across Latin America are building momentum for holding tech companies accountable to design technology with children’s rights in mind.

Across the region, policymakers are increasingly responding to tech companies’ failure to embed age-appropriate design into their products and services. Yet the debate remains dominated by measures to restrict children’s access to social media, an approach that leaves the underlying problem of tech companies’ exploitative business models untouched.

Brazil’s ECA Digital offers a more holistic alternative. Echoing the standards set out in UNCRC General comment No. 25 and shaped by over three years of research and campaigning by 5Rights and partners, it takes a risk-based approach that places the responsibility for children’s online safety and privacy squarely on companies. Crucially, it requires them to prioritise children’s best interests and prohibits manipulative design practices that undermine children’s autonomy and decision-making capacity. As momentum for comprehensive regulatory frameworks grows across the region, ECA Digital sets a meaningful precedent for other countries to build on.

At the VII Ibero-American Conference on Children’s Rights in Brasilia and at a webinar organised by Chicos.net and Protección Digital Argentina, civil society, regulatory bodies and academics from across the region came together to examine the challenges and opportunities ahead. The 10 regulatory principles set out in 5Rights’ Building a digital environment designed with children in mind provided a framework for discussion, including on the impacts of AI.

Now endorsed by over 55 leading organisations and experts from Mexico, Ecuador, Colombia, Argentina, Brazil and beyond, these principles reflect a growing consensus. Digital products and services must be tested before they reach the market, children’s rights and safety must be embedded by design and default, and these obligations must be enforceable, not voluntary.

Policymakers and regulators across Latin America now have a critical opportunity to translate these international best practices into robust frameworks which are fully implemented and effectively enforced.