Social media platform Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, has found itself in the midst of a firestorm following its decision to lower the minimum age requirement for using the popular messaging app WhatsApp. The recent move, which came into effect on Thursday, April 13th, reduces the age limit from 16 to 13 years old across the United Kingdom and the European Union.

The controversial change has drawn swift and severe criticism from various quarters, with child advocacy groups and concerned lawmakers voicing their vehement opposition to Meta’s decision. At the forefront of this backlash stands Smartphone Free Childhood, a campaign group dedicated to safeguarding children’s well-being in the digital age.

Daisy Greenwell, the co-founder of Smartphone Free Childhood, did not mince words in her scathing rebuke of Meta’s move. Speaking to The Times, she accused the tech giant of prioritizing shareholder profits over children’s safety, labeling the decision as “completely tone deaf” and a blatant disregard for the mounting concerns raised by scientists, doctors, teachers, child safety experts, parents, and mental health professionals.

“WhatsApp is putting shareholder profits first and children’s safety second,” Greenwell asserted. “Reducing their age of use from 16 to 13 years old is completely tone deaf and ignores the increasingly loud alarm bells being rung by scientists, doctors, teachers, child safety experts, parents and mental health experts alike.”

Greenwell’s criticism extended further, highlighting the perception among parents that WhatsApp is the “safest” social media app due to its primary function as a messaging platform. However, she cautioned against this false sense of security, likening WhatsApp to a “gateway drug” that could potentially lead children to explore other, potentially riskier, social media platforms.

“Among parents, WhatsApp is seen as the safest social media app, ‘because it’s just messaging, right?’” Greenwell elaborated. “And in that way it works like a gateway drug for the rest of the social media apps. If you’re messaging your friends on WhatsApp, why not message them on Snapchat?“

Echoing Greenwell’s concerns, Vicky Ford, a Conservative Member of Parliament and a member of the education select committee, lambasted Meta’s decision to lower the age recommendation without consulting parents as “highly irresponsible.”

The backlash against Meta’s decision extends beyond advocacy groups and legislators, as Prime Minister Rishi Sunak weighed in on the matter during a recent BBC interview. Sunak emphasized the impending Online Safety Act, which will grant the regulator powers to ensure social media companies are adequately protecting children from harmful material.

“They shouldn’t be seeing it, particularly things like self-harm, and if they don’t comply with the guidelines that the regulator puts down there will be in for very significant fines, because like any parent we want our kids to be growing up safely, out playing in fields or online,” Sunak stated.

In response to the backlash, WhatsApp has defended its decision, claiming that the change brings the age limit in line with the majority of countries and asserting that protections are in place to safeguard users. Ironically, just this week, Meta unveiled a range of new safety features designed to protect users, particularly young people, from “sextortion” and intimate image abuse.

Among these new features is the testing of a filter in Direct Messages (DMs) on Instagram, called Nudity Protection, which will be enabled by default for those aged under 18. This filter will automatically blur images sent to users that are detected as containing nudity. Additionally, when receiving nude images, users will see a message urging them not to feel pressured to respond, along with an option to block the sender and report the chat.