Kids removed from Google image searches

Parents will be able to have images of their children removed from Google search results.

The company have announced a range of changes to child-safety measures on several products, including giving young people "more control over their digital footprint" with the search engine action.

The firm said: "Of course, removing an image from search doesn't remove it from the web but we believe this change will help give young people more control of their images online."

Other alterations to their products include the removal of "overly commercial content" from YouTube Kids and a change to the adverts permitted to be targeted at under 18s.

Google said in a post to the YouTube blog: "We've never allowed paid product placements in YouTube Kids.

"In the coming weeks, we'll also begin to remove overly commercial content from YouTube Kids, such as a video that only focuses on product packaging or directly encourages children to spend money."

In addition, YouTube will turn off autoplay as a default setting to prevent the automatic play of unsuitable videos and will change the default mode for uploaded videos for children to the "most private option".

And that's not all as they will be stopping ads being targeted according to children's age, gender or interests, and also preventing younger users from seeing "age sensitive" adverts.

Safe Search will be turned on for minors and young people will be unable to use Location History, which constantly tracks and logs a phone's location.

The company said: "Some countries are implementing regulations in this area - and as we comply with these regulations, we're looking at ways to develop consistent product experiences and user controls for kids and teens."

However, age-verification measures won't be used so people may be able to get around the controls.

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