Companies like Instagram are getting heavily fined (and dragged through the publicity coals) over how they have mishandled children’s privacy on their platforms.It also noted that social media use by these younger consumers is extensive: of those between 8 and 17 years of age using social media, some 77% are using services on one of the larger platforms under their own profile; 60% of those in the younger bracket of that group, aged 8 to 12, have accounts under their own profiles (others use their parents’ it seems).The three pieces of research, commissioned by Ofcom from three separate organizations — Yonder Consulting, Revealing Reality, and the Digital Regulation Cooperation Forum — are coming out ahead of the U.K. pushing forward on the Online Safety Bill.But the mandate of the bill is a tricky (if not potentially self-contradicting) one, aiming to both “make the UK the safest place in the world to be online” while also “defending free expression.”In that regard, the research Ofcom is publishing could be viewed as a cautionary signal of what not to overlook, and what could easily spill into mismanagement if not handled correctly, regardless of which platform those younger users are using at the moment.The choices that parents are making to help their younger ones skirt around age requirements also highlight just how entangled digital platforms have become in the lives of their young people, and how good intentions might land in the wrong way."