Kids exposed to social media posts about violence and suicide

A BBC investigation has found young teenagers are being exposed to content about weapons, bullying, murder and suicide soon after joining social media platforms.

The project, which saw six fictional profiles set up as 13-15-year-olds, found they were shown the “worrying” posts within just minutes of scrolling on TikTok and YouTube. They were also guided to sexually suggestive content on Instagram.

Online safety expert David Wright said: “While the findings are concerning they are, unfortunately, not surprising.”

TikTok and Instagram said accounts used by children automatically have restrictions in place, while YouTube said it recently expanded protections for teens.

This article contains descriptions of online content that some might find upsetting.

You can get access to help and advice on the topics mentioned via the BBC Action line.

The BBC is also running a live page about online safety today, with exclusive stories and expert speakers. You can view it here.

We [BBC journalists Andy Howard and Harriet Robinson] set up fictional social media profiles for:

Sophie, Maya, and Aisha on Instagram and TikTok.

Harry, Ash and Kai on Youtube and TikTok.

We scrolled each of their profiles for 10 minutes per day for a week.

Amongst the endless posts about sport, gaming and beauty (some of the topics we initially searched for) there were others, seemingly unrelated to our profiles – that we did not ever search for – that felt more sinister.

While Instagram proved to be less concerning overall, it did expose two of the children to sexualised content.

You can see our methodology towards the bottom of this article.

Here’s what we found:

Her profile said she was a big fan of Taylor Swift, reads fantasy and romance novels. She loves cute animals and spending time with friends.

The big theme with this profile was mental health, including several TikTok posts about young people who had taken their own lives after being bullied, showing their gravestones.

In one 10-minute session Sophie was also exposed to two posts on TikTok where the person posting said they were suicidal, with other people making similar comments.

There was some talk of self-harm, though it was mainly videos of celebrities speaking to fans with scars and urging them not to do it.

Sophie also came across a post about abuse with people commenting underneath that they were also experiencing this, for example: “I have an abusive dad”, “me too”