United Kingdom: Closed consultation on draft guidance for services "Likely to be accessed" by children under the Children's Code

On 19 May 2023, the public consultation closes on the United Kingdom Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) draft guidance documents, including factors, case studies, and a draft impact assessment, clarifying the definition of information services that are “likely to be assessed” by children in the context of the Children’s Code. The update to the Guidelines follows the ICO clarification in September 2022 that adult-only services fall under the Code only if they are “likely to be assessed by a significant number of children” without providing a definition. The purpose of the guidance is to provide clarity on language or numeric thresholds. Some factors provided by the ICO for information services to determine if children are accessing or likely to access a service include any actual information that the service provider may have, such as the number of child users on the service, any research evidence or trends in user behaviour, advertising targeting children, or complaints received about children access. After processing the comments submitted during the consultation, the ICO will adopt the final version of the Guidelines.