For over 3 years, TTC Labs has brought together 125 organisations globally to explore what good people-centred design looks like in the best interests of young people.

In March 2021, TTC Labs published a second version of its design guide, based on extensive feedback, alongside a visual explainer and open-source tools to help any organization design for youth privacy and safety. 

Most recently, TTC Labs hosted a virtual Summit with the participation of experts form global and national policymakers and regulators, as well as industry, academia, civil society and young people. The Summit was attended by 150 professionals across privacy and safety, as well as product makers and advocates.

You can explore the full programme and recordings below.

Key takeaways from the Summit

The TTC Labs Summit provided expert insights into how organizations might better focus on young people’s needs when designing digital policies and products, including:

  • Understand young people more holistically for better outcomes. Organizations need to develop a wider-ranging appreciation of young people and their lives across social contexts, including family and homelife, school and social networks. There is no single childhood experience: there is a diversity of childhoods that varies regionally as well as across social and individual contexts. For social and individual settings, we need to consider multiple forms of careand digital products should support different familial situations. We should also think about what the digital equivalents of playground and graduation experiences look like for youth as they mature.

  • Change is constant for young people, so how do digital service providers evolve with them? As youth rapidly develop and their lives change, young people need to be able to make mistakes and not have permanent marks or limitations to their progress and access to opportunities. Product makers should be encouraging young people to find meaning in digital encounters by developing creativity, empathy and critical thinking skills through playful interaction. Good design means encouragement and empowerment to exert agency and choice over how they engage, including options for anonymity.

  • Youth participation is important. Young people care about data and privacy - they’re capable of understanding complex relationships with life online as much as offline. They can also provide deep insight through participatory approaches across digital policymaking and product making processes. Youth should be involved beyond a tick-box exercise much earlier in these processes. They shouldn’t be blamed if digital policies and products designed without their input don’t work well for them. Organizations are increasingly looking to develop meaningful participatory mechanisms - there is a need for much more inclusive design practices in order to change outcomes for future generations of young people.

Watch the full videos from each day of the Summit for deeper insights!

Day 1 Timestamps:

  • Opening Remarks from Pavni Diwanji, VP Engineering, Facebook - 05:00  

  • Panel 1: "Translating Best Interests into Design: What’s next for policy and product makers" (Ireland's Data Protection Commission, Mexico's INAI, Brazil's Alana Foundation, UK's Digital Futures Commission /LSE, Facebook)- 13:55

  • Youth Panel: "Design for Privacy and Safety Online: Experiences and Opinions" (EU's Better Internet for Kids Youth Ambassadors) - 50:55

  • Facebook Lightning Talk - 1:03:56   

  • Nielsen Norman Lightning Talk - 1:14:11

  • Designing for Children's Rights Lightning Talk - 1:20:38

  • Media Monitoring Africa Lightning Talk - 1:31:05                                                                                      

Day 2 Timestamps:

  • Opening Remarks: Erin Egan, VP & Chief Privacy Officer, Facebook - 02:02

  • Keynote: Prof. Joe Cannataci, UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Privacy - 09:18

  • Panel: (Co-)design with and for Youth: Towards Best Practices (UNICEF, UK's ICO, France's CNIL, USA's Harvard Berkman Klein Center, Nigeria's CCHUb, Facebook) - 23:08

  • Youth Panel: Co-design with and for Youth: Experiences and Opinions (EU's Better Internet for Kids Youth Ambassadors) - 59:10

  • YUX Lightning Talk - 1:16:46

  • Meeco Lightning Talk - 1:24:05

  • Joan Ganz Cooney Research Center, Sesame Workshop Lightning Talk - 1:31:01

  • Data & Society Lightning Talk - 1:24:05

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