LONDON – A German government adviser said that children under the age of 14 should be banned from using a smartphone. Julia von Weiler warned that children are being exposed to pornography at a young age.
Innocence in Danger?
Ms. Von Weiler is the director of an organization called Innocence in Danger, and advises the German government. She said: “Just as we protect children from alcohol or other drugs, we should also protect them from the risks of using smartphones at too early an age.” She explained that children as young as 9 were accessing pornography and distributing sexual videos of their peers.
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Judith Dobbrow, of the Berlin state criminal investigations office, confirmed to Deutsche Welle that “the number of complaints to police in this area has grown considerably over the past years.”
Johannes-Wilhelm Rörig, the German government’s abuse commissioner added: “A law restricting the age for using smartphones would possibly be a quick and apparently simple solution.” However, he warned that it would not help solve the more fundamental problems of protecting children from accessing inappropriate content online.
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