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Ofcom has warned social media sites they could be named and shamed – and banned for under-18s – if they fail to comply with new online safety rules.

The media regulator has published draft codes of practice which require tech firms to have more robust age-checking measures, and to reformulate their algorithms to steer children away from what it called “toxic” material.

But parents of children who died after exposure to harmful online content have described the proposed new rules as “insufficient” – one told the BBC change was happening “at a snail’s pace.”

In statements, Meta and Snapchat said they had extra protections for under-18s, and offered parental tools to control what children can see on their platforms.

It is Ofcom’s job to enforce new, stricter rules following the introduction of the Online Safety Act – these codes set out what tech firms must do to comply with that law.

Ofcom says they contain more than 40 “practical measures.”

The centrepiece is the requirement around algorithms, which are used to decide what is shown in people’s social media feeds.

Ofcom says tech firms will need to configure their algorithms to filter out the most harmful content from children’s feeds, and reduce the visibility and prominence of other harmful content.

Other proposed measures include forcing companies to perform more rigorous age checks if they show harmful content, and making them implement stronger content moderation, including a so-called “safe search” function on search engines that restricts inappropriate material.

A breakthrough technique developed by University of Oxford researchers could one day provide tailored repairs for those who suffer brain injuries. The researchers demonstrated for the first time that neural cells can be 3D printed to mimic the architecture of the cerebral cortex. These results have been published today in the journal Nature Communications.  

Brain injuries, including those caused by trauma, stroke and surgery for brain tumours, typically result in significant damage to the cerebral cortex (the outer layer of the human brain), leading to difficulties in cognition, movement and communication. For example, each year, around 70 million people globally suffer from traumatic brain injury (TBI), with 5 million of these cases being severe or fatal. Currently, there are no effective treatments for severe brain injuries, leading to serious impacts on quality of life.

Tissue regenerative therapies, especially those in which patients are given implants derived from their own stem cells, could be a promising route to treat brain injuries in the future. Up to now, however, there has been no method to ensure that implanted stem cells mimic the architecture of the brain.

In this new study, the University of Oxford researchers fabricated a two-layered brain tissue by 3D printing human neural stem cells. When implanted into mouse brain slices, the cells showed convincing structural and functional integration with the host tissue.

Huawei will launch its complete set of commercial 5.5G next year, the vendor announced at Mobile World Congress (MWC) Shanghai.

5G deployments have progressed rapidly over the past four years and Huawei says that the technology is already yielding significant financial gains.

Today there are more than 260 commercial 5G networks worldwide, serving over 1.2 billion users and there are already 115 million gigabit f5G users.

However, new services continue to require stronger 5G network capabilities and the industry has widely agreed that 5.5G will be a key milestone in the evolution of the network.

Huawei proposed the concept of a “5.5G Era” which is based on an end-to-end solution that integrates technologies including 5.5G, F5.5G and Net5.5G.

The 5.5G Era would feature 10 gigabit peak downlink speeds and gigabit peak uplink speeds to meet increasingly diverse service requirements. It would also refresh the industry vision by using new technologies like passive IoT to unlock a market of 100 billion IoT connections.

Yang Chaobin, director and president of ICT solutions at Huawei said: “With a clearly defined standardisation schedule, the 5.5G Era is already poised for technological and commercial verification.

“In 2024, Huawei will launch a complete set of commercial 5.5G network equipment to be prepared for the commercial deployment of 5.5G.

“We look forward to working with all industry players to embark on the new journey towards the 5.5G era.”

In addition to the development of key technologies for 5.5G wireless and optical access networks, Yang announced that the company has been working on applying AI-native technologies to 5.5G core networks to continuously enhance network capabilities and availability.

This would allow AI capabilities to be delivered to the very ends of networks, so that they can better serve numerous industries.

Net5.5G promises 10 gigabit access, ultra-broadband transport, and microsecond-level latency over AI networks, allowing it to serve as a next-generation network foundation for industrial digitalisation by providing high-quality network access.

Huawei adds that the industry is still in the early stages of developing a vision for 6G. This is why many have turned to 5.5G for future development.