UN Convention on the Rights of the Child
Digital technologies are now considered vital to the current lives and futures of children, serving as a central dimension of their daily reality. The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) supports children’s rights by asserting that these rights must be respected, protected, and fulfilled within the digital environment, ensuring that innovations in technology serve to promote children’s safe and equitable engagement.
By facilitating meaningful access to digital tools, the UNCRC helps children realise their full range of civil, political, cultural, economic, and social rights. The benefits of this support are extensive: digital technologies provide children with unprecedented opportunities to access information from around the world, participate in social and political life at all levels, and maintain vital family relationships. Furthermore, the digital environment fosters creativity, identity formation, and educational growth, offering high-quality inclusive resources for formal and self-directed learning.
Meaningful access to digital technologies can help children realise a wide range of rights set out in the UNCRC. Digital tools can support children’s access to information, education and services, helping them learn, develop new skills and engage with the world around them. They can also create opportunities for children and young people to express their views, participate in decisions that affect them, connect with others and take part in cultural and social life.
Digital technologies can play an important role in supporting inclusion by providing accessible and adaptable learning experiences that help meet the diverse needs of children and young people. They can enable children to engage with learning and communication in ways that work best for them, promoting greater participation and reducing barriers to involvement.
However, the UNCRC makes clear that children’s rights must be respected, protected and fulfilled in digital environments. This includes ensuring that children are safe online, that their privacy and personal data are protected, and that digital technologies are developed and used in ways that support their wellbeing and best interests. When these principles are embedded in policy, design and practice, digital technologies can support children to access opportunities, participate meaningfully and have their rights realised in an increasingly digital world.
Children’s Parliament – Exploring Children’s Rights and AI
This three-stage project (2022–2024) empowers Scottish children to shape the nation’s AI Strategy by exploring technology through a human rights lens. After two stages of intensive workshops and “missions,” four priority themes emerged:
- AI Literacy: Children demand that AI be integrated into the school curriculum so they can understand the technology defining their future and learn how to keep themselves safe.
- Privacy & Safety: There is a strong call for stricter data regulations, child-friendly transparency, and the requirement of informed consent before children’s data is used.
- Fairness & Human Oversight: Children are deeply concerned about algorithmic bias and discrimination. They prioritise human empathy, especially in healthcare and education, insisting that AI should support, rather than replace, trusted adults.
- Inclusion: AI systems must be intentionally designed to accommodate diverse needs, including neurodivergence and disabilities.
The project’s primary outcome, 12 Calls to Action, formally demands that adult decision-makers “just ask us,” treating children as equal stakeholders in AI development and regulation
Ultimately, the reports conclude that children are highly capable of navigating complex technical concepts when equipped with rights-based knowledge.
Appropriate Use: Generative AI
Be aware that these Generative AI tools contain functionality which allows the upload of pictures and files. It is the responsibility of the user not to upload content or enter prompts which may generate inappropriate or concerning text or imagery, or which contains any personal, sensitive or confidential information.
Please also refer to the Scottish Government’s AI Guidance for Schools when using any kind of AI tool within education.