British regulator Ofcom said social media platforms TikTok and YouTube have failed to deliver meaningful changes aimed at reducing harmful content and remain unsafe for children.
In a statement, Ofcom said both platforms had pledged to reduce harmful material shown to children but had made little noticeable progress.
The regulator said multiple pieces of evidence suggested that the platforms were still not adequately protecting children from harmful online content.
According to the statement, laws related to children’s online safety were introduced in July 2025, but there had been little overall reduction in children’s exposure to harmful content since then.
Ofcom said 35% of children aged between 11 and 17 admitted they had encountered harmful material while scrolling through their feeds.
The regulator added that 53% of children reported seeing harmful content on TikTok, while 36% said they saw such material on YouTube, 34% on Instagram and 31% on Facebook.
A separate Ofcom survey conducted in November and December 2025 found that seven out of every 10 children aged 11 to 17 had experienced exposure to harmful online content.
The latest findings also showed that 84% of children aged 8 to 12 continued to use at least one of the five most popular online services YouTube, Facebook, TikTok, Instagram and Snapchat despite the minimum age requirement of 13 on those platforms.
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Ofcom said it had submitted legal requests to Meta, TikTok and YouTube seeking detailed information about the type of content children were viewing and what further safety measures should be implemented.
