One in three children in the UK lie about their age on social media, say the media regulator Ofcom.
Many social media platforms, such as Instagram, do not allow those under 13 years of age to use the site and do not give under 18s full access to the site but research has found children are not truthful about their age.
Ofcom says this adds to the chance that children will see material that may be harmful or not be suitable for them.
Anna-Sophie Harling, a representative for Ofcom explained that what age you claim to be has a “huge impact” on what users are shown.
She mentioned the recent inquest into the death of Molly Russell - who a coroner found “may had been influenced” by what the 14-year-old school girl was shown by the algorthrim on sites such as Instagram and Pinterest - as an example of “tragic outcomes” possible.
Anna-Sophie told BBC News: "That was a very specific case of harmful content that had very detrimental impacts and tragic outcomes on a family in the UK.
"When we talk about potentially harmful content to under-18s, it's content that might have more significant negative consequences for under-18s because they're still developing.
"When children are repeatedly exposed to images and videos that contain certain images, they're then essentially led to act in different ways or to think differently about themselves or their friends."
The report found that 32 per cent of children own an account meant for adults, 47 per cent of kids aged eight to 15 have an account identifying them as 16 or older. Sixty per cent of children using social media- below - possess their own accounts even while being too young.
Anna-Sophie added: "If we want to get serious about protecting children online, we need to make sure that platforms have a way to find out exactly how old those users are," she said.
"We need to work both with parents and young people, but also platforms, to make sure that the ages at which those accounts are set are done in an accurate way."
YouTube responded to the report by highlighting their efforts to protect young people, such as launching a kid centric app and bringing in special data handling methods for content aimed at them.
Meta - who owns and operates Facebook and Instagram - pointed out their scheme of getting younger users to “ask others to vouch for their age” and their increasing use of tech to verify ages.
