IEEE, the world's largest technical professional organization dedicated to advancing technology for humanity, and the IEEE Standards Association (IEEE SA) announced the publication of IEEE 2089™-2021 - Standard for Age Appropriate Digital Services Framework. This is based on the 5Rights Principles to support the growing need for designing digital products and services with the best interests of children in mind at the UNICEF Global Forum on AI for Children.

IEEE 2089-2021 is the first in a family of standards built upon the 5Rights principles for children and establishes a framework for developing age-appropriate digital services for situations where users are children. This standard has been developed to fill a gap between global efforts to ensure that young people are catered for by design in the digital world, and a lack of practical guidance for how to achieve this. It will help organizations identify and mitigate risks, and seek out opportunities to make their services age-appropriate– designed with the best interests of children in mind.  

In its child-centred design approach, risks are considered in advance. This framework encompasses the following key areas:

• recognition that the user is a child and upholding children’s rights
• acknowledgement of the diversity of children and young people
• utilization of fair terms appropriate to children
• presentation of information in an age-appropriate way and offers a level of validation for service design decisions
• prioritization of children’s best interest over commercial interests.