How Looma Protects Kids
Safety isn't a feature on Looma. It's the foundation. Every line of code, every interaction, every default starts with a single question: Is this safe for a child?
Safety by Design. Not by Default Setting.
Most Social Media platforms add safety as an afterthought. A setting buried in a menu. A reporting button that goes nowhere. Looma is a Social Utility engineered differently, with safety enforced at the server layer, not just hidden in the interface.
Protection Beyond Compliance
All restrictions exceed regulatory minimums. We treat the spirit of child safety legislation as our baseline, not its letter.
Privacy-Preserving Verification
No biometric data. No mandatory document uploads. Age assurance uses OS-level signals, payment validation, and community vouching.
Oversight Without Surveillance
Parents get meaningful control, quiet periods, PIN-gated profile switching, without access to granular activity logs.
Gradual Autonomy
Each tier unlock is calibrated to developmental milestones, letting the platform grow with the user in a clinically appropriate way.
Five Tiers. Calibrated to Each Stage of Growth.
Children don't need the same platform as adults. Looma's experience changes based on age, with the youngest users receiving the strongest protections, enforced at the server level, not just the user interface.
No Platform Access
Registration is prevented at the age-verification stage. This is a hard technical block consistent with COPPA, the UK Children's Code, and GDPR Article 8.
- Account creation prevented
- No platform features accessible
The Commons Only
Users in early adolescence are directed to curated, moderated community spaces. The social graph is fully locked: no DMs, no calls, no followers.
- Curated community access
- No social feed
- No DMs or calling
- No content creation
- No followers or social graph
- 30-minute daily cap
Friends Feed Unlocks
Closed-network peer model: 16-year-olds can only follow and be followed by other supervised users. No cross-tier contact possible.
- Friends Feed (peer-only)
- Messaging with mutuals only
- No commenting
- No public feed
- Built-in quiet periods
- 45-minute daily cap
Public Feed Unlocks
Late adolescence warrants expanded autonomy. The public feed is chronological, never algorithmic, with commenting and external sharing enabled.
- Chronological public feed
- Full open social graph
- Commenting & sharing
- No marketplace
- No precise location
- 45-minute daily cap
Full Platform Access
Full platform autonomy with a configurable 60-minute daily browsing cap, because healthy digital habits matter at every age, not just for children.
- All features unlocked
- Looma Gives access
- Marketplace & Spaces
- Configurable daily cap
- Full account management
Enforced at the Server, Not the UI
Every follow request, every profile view, every search is validated server-side against the user's age tier. These rules cannot be bypassed by direct API calls or by modifying the app.
This is the difference between safety as a feature and safety as architecture.
Four Pillars of Real Safety
Each of these is a deliberate design decision, and a deliberate trade-off against engagement metrics that other platforms refuse to make.
1 Real-Time Content Moderation
Every post, message, and comment is screened in real time, before publication or delivery, for four primary harm categories:
- Bullying — personal attacks, body-shaming, targeted ridicule
- Harassment — threatening language, sustained unwanted contact
- Hate speech — content that dehumanises or discriminates
- CSAM — zero-tolerance; auto-reported to law enforcement
Content classified as unsafe is blocked at the transmission layer. It is never delivered and never stored.
2 Mutual-Follow Messaging
Direct messages are only possible between users who mutually follow each other. Both users must be in each other's following list before any conversation can be initiated.
This eliminates the single most common online harm vector for adolescents: unsolicited contact from unknown individuals. Grooming, harassment campaigns, and exploitation attempts overwhelmingly begin with cold messages.
By making cold-contact architecturally impossible, Looma prevents harm before it starts, rather than relying on users to report it after the fact.
3 Parent-Controlled Child Profiles
For children too young to manage their own accounts, Looma offers child sub-profiles linked to a verified parent or guardian account.
- Parent creates and verifies their own account first
- Child profiles exist under the parent's main account
- PIN-gated profile switching prevents children from accessing adult-tier content
- Notifications route through parent's safety settings on shared devices
This is how age verification should work: by verifying the responsible adult, not demanding documents from a 10-year-old.
4 Healthy Use, Not Engagement Maximisation
Social Media is designed to be addictive. Looma is designed to be enough.
- Mandatory breaks during extended sessions
- Daily caps by tier: 30 min (13-15), 45 min (16-17), 60 min (adult)
- Forced pauses that cannot be bypassed
- Quiet periods overnight to protect sleep, fixed for minors
- No algorithmic feed. Chronological order at every tier.
We measure success by whether kids close the app feeling good. Not by how long they stayed.
How We Actually Know How Old You Are
The strongest safety tiers in the world are only as effective as the system that assigns users to them. A child who lies about their age and gains adult access has bypassed every protection designed for them. Looma solves this with four independent verification paths and a community that acts as a continuous check on accuracy.
OS Age Signal
Looma reads age data directly from Apple App Store and Google Play accounts at login. OS-level accounts are typically tied to verified identity and payment information.
This is the primary verification method: automatic, frictionless, and the highest-confidence signal available.
Credit Card Validation
When OS signals are unavailable, adults may verify through a payment-method check. Looma uses Stripe to perform a $0 authorization (no charge), confirming the user controls an adult payment method.
Card details are processed by Stripe. Looma stores only the verification status, never card data.
QR Proximity Vouching
Adults without a card may be vouched for by someone who personally knows them. The user generates a one-time QR code, protected by screen security, which a verified adult scans in person, declaring how they know the user.
One vouch from an identity-verified user, or three vouches from card-verified users, grants full access. Vouched users cannot vouch for others.
Identity Verification
Users may choose to complete identity verification through Looma's verification provider for the highest trust level and full platform access.
Looma stores only the resulting verification status, not document images, document numbers, or biometric data.
🚨 Community Oversight: The Report-as-Minor Feature
Verification isn't a one-time event on Looma. Every profile, every conversation, and every community member list includes a dedicated "Report as Minor" option, separate from content reports, that any user can use if they believe an account belongs to someone under 18.
When flagged, the account is immediately downgraded to Unverified status and the holder receives a re-verification prompt within 24 hours. This turns the entire Looma community into a continuous age-verification check, catching misclassifications that no automated system alone can reliably detect.
Why a Social Utility Protects Kids Better
A Social Utility is built to serve its community. Social Media is built to extract from it. That structural difference shows up in every safety decision.
What Looma Will Never Do
These aren't policies that can change when a new investor demands growth. They're structural commitments built into the platform's architecture, and into the governance model that prevents anyone, including Looma's own leadership, from weakening them unilaterally.
- Sell child data, ever
- Show targeted ads to minors
- Use engagement-maximising algorithms on any users
- Allow features that could be exploited by predators
- Compromise safety for growth
- Hide safety policies behind menus
- Let cross-tier social contact happen
- Use AI-generated content of any kind
- Collect biometric data for age verification
- Store raw age verification signals
- Allow unverified accounts to participate in governance
- Grant full access when verification is unavailable
Platform Safety Specification — Public Edition
A detailed breakdown of Looma's safety architecture, clinical rationale, and age-tier design, written for school administrators, youth program directors, journalists, and child safety researchers. For the full technical specification, contact childsafety@looma.social.
Looma Was Built For You.
If you're a parent worried about Instagram, TikTok, or Snapchat, Looma was built for your family. If you lead a church, school, sports team, or youth group, Looma was built for your community. Bring it to the people you care about.
