The Mental Health Coalition (MHC), a nonprofit aimed at socialising, normalising, and destigmatising mental health, has today announced the launch of ‘Safe Online Standards’ (S.O.S), a new standards and ratings system designed to help protect teen mental health online. The initiative has received significant voluntary support from major tech companies including Meta, Google/YouTube, TikTok, Snap, Roblox, Pinterest and Discord, as well as backing from US senators from both sides of the aisle.
The idea behind S.O.S is to provide an independent means for assessing how well a digital platform or service protects teen users’ mental health. Participating businesses will be rated based on their policies, functionality, governance and transparency, digital literacy and well-being, and content, and ultimately publicly awarded one of three ratings: ‘Use Carefully’, ‘Partial Protection’ or ‘Does Not Meet The Standards’.
Thus, parents and teen users themselves can quickly get a sense of the risk associated with each platform, which can inform how they choose to engage with those products. As Dr Tom Insel, former director of the National Institute of Mental Health put it: “We have had a rating system for films for over 50 years. Similar guidance for social media is long overdue.”
Participating businesses conduct a self-assessment to determine how they match up to the S.O.S standards, which is submitted to the MHC for review. The MHC says the S.O.S standards were developed by a steering committee of experts from backgrounds covering youth development, mental health, technology, and safety. The technology companies which have signed up were briefed on the project’s development, but weren’t given any influence, according to the MHC.
Companies which are found not to have reached the safety thresholds outlined in the standards will be given the opportunity to work with the MHC and develop a plan to improve.
S.O.S will also provide a tool for brands and agencies to align media investments based on these ratings, ensuring their ad spend goes towards platforms which meet the standards and protect teen mental health.
“Standards and ratings are commonplace today, except in the online technology space,” said Dr. Dan Reidenberg, founder and director of S.O.S. at The Mental Health Coalition. “The public and advertisers want to know what is a safer place for youth and young adults in their online activities, and now we can help them with that through the S.O.S. program.”
A first step
Protection of mental health, particularly that of young and vulnerable people, has been an issue as long as social media has existed. And over the years we’ve seen horrific cases where platforms’ algorithms have actively pushed harmful content to vulnerable young users. This process is documented in the upcoming Channel 4 documentary Molly vs THE MACHINES, which follows the tragic death of Molly Russell, who took her own life in 2017 after being exposed to large volumes of harmful content on Instagram.
MHC founder Kenneth Cole hopes the S.O.S will be a significant first step in protecting young people who use social media. “For years, we’ve worked to break the stigma that keeps people from talking openly about mental health,” he said. “As more of our lives move online, that work must evolve. Safe Online Standards are not a solution in themselves, but the launch of an ongoing initiative—one that empowers the real stakeholders with a genuine interest in outcomes: users, their parents, and the brands and businesses that shape digital experiences. By creating a shared framework for accountability, S.O.S. helps move us toward online spaces that better support mental health and well-being.”
Australia has recently taken the step of banning under 16s from social platforms, a move which is being considered in a number of other countries. But a number of speakers at the S.O.S launch event in Washington today said their preferred approach is to promote safety altogether, rather than cutting off access altogether.
That’s not to say that S.O.S and its advocates are against legislation. Democrat senator Mark Warner and his Republican colleague Dan Reidenberg both said they are working on legislative efforts to promote safety. But Warner highlighted that voluntary initiatives like S.O.S can be a good first step towards legislation, by bringing tech companies to the table and creating a base to build from.
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