The Rise of Family Influencers and the Exploitation of Children – are there any legal protections in place for children online?

The Surge in Family Vlogging

Ever since its launch in 2005, YouTube has been a dominant force in the social media landscape.[1] Introduced in 2007, YouTube’s Partner Program marked a groundbreaking moment, becoming a pivotal factor in its success over other platforms. This program created a new vocational pathway for content creators, enabling them to turn their daily lives and hobbies into entertainment for others, ensuring a never-ending supply of content for the platform.[2]  In recent years, the surge in the cost of living and stagnant government support have placed unprecedented financial pressures on parents to fend for themselves and their children, leaving many to turn to the Internet as an additional source of income.[3] Thus, as a convenient alternative that can accommodate their childcaring responsibilities, it comes as no surprise that YouTube has attracted many parents to have a go at monetising their family lives as entertainment for viewers.[4]

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Family Vlogging – ‘The Truman Show’ in Real Life?

While family vlogging may appear harmless at face value, it has generated much ethical and legal discourse due to its exploitative nature towards the children filmed in such videos. Yet, the treatment of these children is not foreign, as it bears resemblance with the innovative 1998-psychological drama ‘The Truman Show’. [5]

Indeed, while these babies are aware of being recorded, unlike the main character Truman,[6] they still face a concerning reality: their capacity to consent is denied. Growing up in a world where cameras are omnipresent, they are denied the chance to experience life away from the lens.  Dr Faith Gordon, a professor of law at the Australian National University, highlights the inherent power imbalance ‘between children and adults’ in a family setting, making it difficult for children to resist, especially when the family’s financial stability depends on the content created through vlogging.[7] A prime example is Shay Carl, the creator of the pioneering family vlogging channel ‘The Shaytards’,[8] who began documenting his son’s life from the moment he was born, making him the first ‘Truman baby’.[9]

Most family vloggers, like ‘The Shaytards’, strived to project a ‘picture-perfect’ family image online to stay relevant. However, this relentless pursuit of an idealised image often comes as the expense of their children’s wellbeing. In wrongly prioritising their own reputation, these parents risk neglecting their children’s emotional needs and exposing them to potential child abuse behind the scenes in many cases.

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‘8 passengers’

A clear manifestation of such abuse can be illustrated in the recent prosecution of Ruby Franke for second-degree aggravated child abuse, who was a YouTuber infamous for her controversial parental advice channel, 8 Passengers, which had accumulated 2.5 million subscribers before her arrest.[10]  Launched in 2015, the channel often sparked much controversy as Franke regularly imparted her distorted parenting methods for her six children to viewers.[11] For instance, she once ‘sent her oldest son to a wilderness therapy camp and banned him from his bedroom’ simply for joking around with his younger brother.[12] Franke’s abuse continued up till her arrest. According to her plea agreement, she admitted to starving and isolating another son for three months straight before binding his hands and feet together. [13] Regrettably, this is just ONE of the many incidents of child abuse by family vloggers. Prior to Franke’s conviction, another notorious case was that of the ‘DaddyOFive’ channel, which was a short-lived YouTube channel that had similarly documented the parents’ mental and physical abuse towards their children in an escalation of ‘prank’ videos.[14] Like Franke, the parents behind the channel faced criminal prosecution and ultimately lost custody of their children in the end, allowing their children to be freed from their tyranny at last.

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Need for legal protection in the UK

While the legal system has made strides in addressing the rise of family influencers, there remains room for improvement to prioritise the interest of the child. Ratified by the UK in 1991, the Convention on the Rights of the Child has served as a mechanism that accentuates the ‘civil, political, economic, social, health, and cultural rights of children’.[15] As the de facto ‘pseudo-employees’ of their parents,[16] children of family influencers are like child actors, because they are putting on a show every day while being filmed. Nevertheless, as Dr Rees points out, these children are not compensated within the ‘influencer industry’ like their professional counterparts, negatively impacting their education and future job prospects.[17]

According to the Guardian, the UK remains ‘notable for its prevalence of child influencers’, with more than 10,000 family influencers in the country.[18] Compounding the issue is the unstable nature of social media income. As one’s social media income is dependent on the viewership on their videos, it is imperative for influencers to have a loyal fanbase. Hence, this adds pressure to family influencers to maintain their reputation to keep a consistent viewership, causing some of these parents, like Franke, to resort to extreme measures to ‘discipline’ their children, particularly as ‘global market revenue is forecast to increase to $24bn in 2025’.[19] Thus, strengthening the protection of these child influencers through strict labour and performance regulations would have a monumental impact on the UK, echoing the initial stance set out by the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

UK legislators could benefit from examining policies implemented by other governments to protect child influencers. In October 2020, France became the first country to enshrine ‘the right to be forgotten’, empowering child influencers to request the removal of content about them from social media platforms.[20] Similarly, in July 2024, the U.S. state of Illinois, passed legislation to ‘ensure financial compensation’ for child influencers.[21]

Although these developments have introduced more preventative mechanisms, they are far from sufficient to comprehensively safeguard the wellbeing of child influencers. Nevertheless, these examples provide a valuable starting point for the UK, which has consistently lagged in offering adequate protection for child influencers. Hence, the UK government could follow France’s lead by enshrining children’s rights to privacy or adopt measures similar to the US by expanding child labour legislation to include child influencers. Furthermore, given the steady growth of ‘family influencers’ each year, the risks to children from overexposure continue to escalate.  Now more than ever, it is imperative for the UK government to prioritise children’s rights and take decisive action to prevent further exploitation in the future.

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[1] Peter Suciu, ‘YouTube Remains The Most Dominant Social Media Platform’ (Forbes, 10 December 2021) <https://www.forbes.com/sites/petersuciu/2021/04/07/youtube-remains-the-most-dominant-social-media-platform/ >accessed 10 January 2025.

[2] ibid.

[3] Steven Vass, ‘Family vlogs can entertain, empower and exploit’ (The Conversation, 26 September 2023) <https://theconversation.com/family-vlogs-can-entertain-empower-and-exploit-211093>  accessed 10 January 2025.

[4] ibid.

[5] Amelia Tait, ‘Their lives were documented online from birth. Now, they’re coming age’ (Rolling Stone UK, June/July 2022) < https://www.rollingstone.co.uk/culture/truman-babies-youtube-family-vlogging-generation-18995/ > accessed 10 January 2025.

[6] ibid.

[7] Elaine Obran, ‘Family vlogging is an ethical dilemma we can’t unsubscribe from’ (ANU Reporter, 23 April 2024) <https://reporter.anu.edu.au/all-stories/family-vlogging-is-an-ethical-dilemma-we-cant-unsubscribe-from> accessed 11 January 2025.

[8] Chris Miller, ‘Meet the Shaytards: the story behind the first family of Youtube’ (KUTV, 13 November 2014) <https://kutv.com/amp/news/local/meet-the-shaytards-the-story-behind-the-first-family-of-youtube > accessed 10 January 2025.

[9] Amelia Tait, ‘Their lives were documented online from birth. Now, they’re coming age’ (Rolling Stone UK, June/July 2022) < https://www.rollingstone.co.uk/culture/truman-babies-youtube-family-vlogging-generation-18995/ > accessed 10 January 2025. 

[10] Amy Beth Hanson, ‘Parenting advice YouTuber Ruby Franke charged with aggravated child abuse of 2 of her 6 children’ (AP News, 1 September 2023) < https://apnews.com/article/youtube-mom-parenting-advice-child-abuse-arrest-d011c50c6da8f3535d8dfda46654a50a> accessed 10 January 2025.

[11] ibid.

[12] ibid.

[13] The Associated Press, ‘Ruby Franke, the YouTube mom who gave parenting advice, pleads guilty to child abuse’ (NPR, 18 December 2023) < https://www.npr.org/2023/12/18/1220098496/ruby-franke-the-youtube-mom-who-gave-parenting-advice-pleads-guilty-to-child-abu> accessed 10 January 2025.

[14] Danya Hajjaji, ‘YouTube Lets Parents Exploit Their Kids for Clicks’ (Newsweek, 4 October 2021) <https://www.newsweek.com/youtube-lets-lawless-lucrative-sharenting-industry-put-kids-mercy-internet-1635112  > accessed 10 January 2025.

[15] Human Rights Watch, ‘25th Anniversary of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, Questions and Answers’ (Human Rights Watch, 17 November 2014) < https://www.hrw.org/news/2014/11/17/25th-anniversary-convention-rights-child > accessed 10 January 2025.

[16] Lewis Adams, ‘Child influencers should be protected by new guidelines – expert’ (BBC News, 8 March 2024) < https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-essex-68492141> accessed 11 January 2025.

[17] ibid.

[18] Dan Milmo, ‘UK must protect child influencers from exploitation, MPs say’ (The Guardian, 9 May 2022) < https://www.theguardian.com/media/2022/may/09/uk-must-protect-child-influencers-exploitation-social-media> accessed 10 January 2025.

[19] ibid.

[20] BBC News, ‘France passes new law to protect child influencers’ (BBC News, 7 October 2020) < https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-54447491 > accessed 11 January 2025.

[21] Angela Yang, ‘Illinois passed a law to protect child influencers. Advocates are cautiously optimistic more states will follow.’ (NBC News, 15 August 2023) < https://www.nbcnews.com/news/child-influencers-law-illinois-reaction-rcna99831> accessed 11 January 2025.