Many of the safety tools that social media companies promote as protecting children do not actually work as advertised, according to a new study that has renewed scrutiny of how the largest platforms police their services for young users. The research put a systematic test to features that parents and regulators have been told make apps safer for minors, and found that a majority fell short. The findings arrive amid mounting political and legal pressure on technology companies over the harms children can encounter online. They also hand ammunition to critics who argue that the industry's safety promises are more marketing than substance.
The study was carried out by researchers at New York University and Northeastern University, who set out to evaluate the protective features rather than simply take the companies at their word. In all, the team examined 86 separate safety features spread across four of the most widely used platforms: Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok and YouTube. By testing whether each tool did what it claimed, the researchers aimed to move the debate beyond corporate assurances and toward measurable evidence. That methodical approach is part of what gave the results their weight.
The headline conclusion was stark. On average, the researchers found that around 60 percent of the features failed at their intended purpose, and every one of the four platforms had a failure rate of at least 50 percent for its advertised protections. Of the 86 features examined, only 35 were judged to work as intended. The remaining 51 fell short in one way or another, painting a picture of safety systems that looked robust on paper but frequently did not hold up when actually put to the test.
The researchers drew a distinction between two kinds of failure. Nine of the features were classified as missing, meaning they either did not exist in practice or could not be triggered at all despite being advertised. Another 34 were described as broken, meaning the tool existed but either failed to accomplish its stated goal or could be trivially circumvented by a determined user. That second category is especially concerning, because a protection that can be easily bypassed can give parents a false sense of security while offering little real safeguard.
The kinds of protections tested go to the heart of parents' worst fears about their children online. Among the features examined were tools meant to prevent adults from messaging children they do not know and mechanisms designed to stop underage accounts from accessing harmful content. When such features fail, the consequences are not abstract, since they are precisely the safeguards intended to keep predators and damaging material away from young users. The study suggested that some of the most important protections were among those that did not reliably work.
The companies behind the platforms have pushed back on the findings. In response to the report, they largely disputed its conclusions, arguing that their features work as intended or that the researchers' tests did not reflect how children and teenagers actually use the apps in everyday life. That defense mirrors a familiar pattern in disputes over online safety, in which platforms question the methodology of critical studies rather than concede that their tools fall short. The disagreement leaves parents to weigh competing claims about how protected their children really are.
The research feeds directly into a broader reckoning over the responsibilities of social media companies toward their youngest users. Lawmakers in the United States and elsewhere have been pressing for stronger rules on age verification, default protections and accountability, and studies like this one are likely to feature in those debates. By quantifying just how many safety features fall short, the report sharpens the argument that voluntary, company-designed safeguards may not be enough on their own. For families, the practical takeaway is a reminder that the safety settings offered by the apps cannot always be assumed to work as promised.