India’s existing online safety laws are not adequately equipped to deal with the risks created by recommendation algorithms, infinite scrolling and engagement-driven design, according to a new report published by NALSAR University of Law and the Indian Governance and Policy Project (IGAP).Titled The Child Safety Imperative: Age-Appropriate Digital Governance Pathways for India, the October 2026 report identifies a significant gap between the harms India’s laws currently address and the way contemporary digital platforms are built.While existing legislation covers offences such as online harassment, sexual exploitation, the circulation of unlawful content and certain forms of data misuse, the report argues that another category of harm remains harder to regulate: the cumulative effects of platform design on children’s behaviour and wellbeing.Features such as infinite scroll, engagement-optimised recommendations and reward-based interactions may encourage prolonged or repetitive use. Image-heavy platforms and social comparison can affect some adolescents’ perceptions of their bodies and self-worth, while recommendation systems can progressively narrow the content users encounter.The difficulty, the report explains, is that such harms do not necessarily involve an identifiable offender or a single illegal act.
Instead, their effects may emerge through repeated exposure, platform architecture and the commercial incentives that shape the user experience.When the design is part of the problemThe distinction is particularly relevant to platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and TikTok, where personalised recommendations and engagement features are central to how content is distributed and consumed.The report’s analysis marks a departure from an approach to online child safety that focuses primarily on removing harmful material after it has appeared.It argues that a legal framework concerned largely with individual wrongdoing is less suited to examining the cumulative effects of recommendation systems and persuasive interfaces.India’s laws, including the Information Technology Act, the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, address different elements of online harm. But the report finds that their combined coverage still leaves significant questions around platform design.As a result, certain potentially harmful design practices may remain lawful even when they carry developmental, psychological or social consequences.Should platforms have to assess risks before launching features?One of the report’s central recommendations is to make safety considerations part of product development, rather than relying principally on complaints and corrective action after harm has occurred.It proposes considering child-safety risk assessments before new products or functionalities are introduced, greater scrutiny of attention-capturing mechanisms, and recommendation options that do not rely on user profiling.It also calls for age-appropriate privacy settings and safeguards to be enabled by default.The implication for digital platforms is significant. Instead of limiting compliance to content moderation and takedown requests, companies could be expected to demonstrate that features likely to be used by children have been assessed for foreseeable risks.This would require a different kind of regulatory oversight, involving technical scrutiny of recommendation systems and engagement design.A gap between law and platform behaviourThe report argues that regulators would need sufficient technical expertise and institutional capacity to assess such systems effectively.
It also recommends a dedicated, principle-based framework for online child safety rather than relying only on individual platform-specific compliance rules.Importantly, the researchers do not suggest that all algorithmic recommendations or digital engagement are inherently harmful. The report acknowledges the educational, creative and social benefits of online participation.
Its argument is that the risks associated with platform design need to be addressed directly, particularly when products are accessed by younger users.For India’s digital industry, the question raised by the report goes beyond what content platforms permit children to see. It concerns how those platforms decide what children see next, how long they stay and whether safeguards are built into the experience in the first place.Follow Storyboard18 on Google for the latest and breaking digital news and industry updates, along with in-depth coverage of digital media and gaming news. Stay informed with the latest perspectives only on Storyboard18.First Published on October 13, 2026, 17:18:08 IST
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