Children flock to social networks

More than a quarter of eight to 11-year-olds who are online in the UK have a profile on a social network, research shows.
Most sites, such as Bebo, MySpace and Facebook, set a minimum age of between 13 and 14 to create a profile but none actively enforce the age limit.
Ofcom's survey of 5,000 adults and 3,000 children found 49% of those aged between eight and 17 have a profile. The Ofcom report looks into the impact of social networks on people's lives in the UK as part of a wider media literacy campaign and surveyed 5,000 adults and more than 3,000 children. Its statistics suggest that around 19% of all UK youngsters have a presence on a social networking site.

SOCIAL NETWORKING SURVEY
49% of children 8-17 have an online profile
22% of 16+ have an online profile
On average adults have profiles on 1.6 sites
63% of 8 to 17-year-olds with a profile use Bebo
37% of 8 to 17-year-olds with profile use MySpace
18% of 8 to 17-year-olds with a profile use Facebook
59% of 8 to 17-year-olds use social networks to make new friends
16% of parents do not know if their child's profile is visible to all
33% of parents say they set no rules for their children's use of social networks
43% of children say their parents set no rules for use of social networks


The three leading social networks, MySpace, Bebo and Facebook, all say they remove profiles of users that are found to be too young on their sites.
But at present no technology is used to actively verify the age of users.
The Home Office guidelines are set to encourage social networking sites to investigate age verification technologies and to give better signposting to users about privacy settings, and warnings about the implications of posting personal details.