Mark Zuckerberg will let kids as young as 10 years old use his company’s VR headsets to enter the metaverse.
The age requirement for the Meta Quest headset was previously 13, but on Friday, the company announced it’s going to lower the age requirement to 10 to 12 years old.
As first reported by The Verge, the change will happen later this year and apply to the Meta Quest 2 and the upcoming Quest 3 headset slated to arrive in the fall starting at $499. However, kids aged 10 to 12 will need permission from their parents to use the headsets.
“We’ll require preteens to get their parent’s approval to set up an account, which will give parents control over the apps their preteens download from our app store,” Meta wrote in a blog post.
During the account setup process, a parent will register the preteen’s age, which will be used to provide “age-appropriate experiences” to the kid. “Parents will control whether their preteen can download or use an app, and parents can block access to apps at any time,” the company added. Other parental controls include time limits on use, the ability for a parent to cast the kid's VR experience to a TV or phone, and hiding the child's active status from other users by default.
Lowering the age requirement could help Zuckerberg sustain interest in the company’s VR headsets when enthusiasm for his metaverse concept has waned. But according to reviews and reports, many underage kids are already bypassing the age restrictions on Quest headsets by logging on with their parents’ accounts.
Meta goes on to say that the VR headset can provide kids with plenty of games and educational experiences. However, the news may rankle US lawmakers. In March, a pair of Democratic US senators demanded the company halt its plan to make its flagship virtual reality app Horizon Worlds available to teens.
Sen. Edward Markey of Massachusetts and Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut are concerned with Meta’s spotty record on privacy and protecting teenagers from the toxicity and sexual content of social media. “Other reports have documented Meta’s failure to stop ads for tobacco, alcohol, and eating disorder content from targeting teens,” they wrote in a letter to the social network.
Despite the criticism, Meta went ahead and lowered the age requirements for Horizon Worlds a month later while instituting new safety measures for teens. However, the company currently has no plans to open Horizon Worlds to the preteen crowd. "Meta Horizon Worlds remains a 13+ app in the US and Canada (18+ in Europe) and will not be available to preteens when parent-managed Meta accounts become available later this year," the company said.
