YouTube is making a series of changes this year to try and better protect children on its service. The latest change is children under the age of 16 will no longer be allowed to live stream directly to an audience on their own.

According to a change announced on the company’s Help pages, and spotted by Android Authority, YouTube will soon move the minimum age for live stream performers from 13 to 16. Children between 13 and 15 can continue to be in live streams, but they need to be accompanied by an adult who is visible in the footage. The adult also needs to be added as a channel manager or owner, and they need to use their account to start the stream.

YouTube’s announcement says, “Additionally, live streams featuring 13 to 15-year-olds who are not visibly accompanied by an adult may have their live chat disabled and the account may temporarily lose access to live chat or other features. In the future, we plan to take down these live streams and the account may temporarily lose its ability to live stream.”

The changes will take effect from July 22. YouTube also shared advice for teens who plan to live stream. The advice is similar to the company’s child safety policy, and it points to things like using privacy settings on a stream, and not sharing personal information such as where they live or go to school.

This is all part of YouTube attempting to improve child safety across its platform. Earlier this year, YouTube announced it would begin testing machine learning algorithms to work out when a viewer is lying about their age. YouTube’s rules say you must be at least 13 to use the main app, while anyone younger is encouraged to use YouTube Kids.

These new machine learning tools predict when a child is using the platform and lying about their age using activity such as the content they’ve watched. If it identifies a child is watching, it will change its algorithms to make sure the child doesn’t see any inappropriate content. It’s currently unclear if YouTube is actively experimenting with this, or whether it’s still yet to launch.

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About James Peckham

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I’ve written tech news for over a decade, and as a Reporter at PCMag, I cover the latest developments across the gadgets and services you use every day. Previously, I worked for Android Police, TechRadar, and more.

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