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Millions of children around the world are using artificial intelligence (AI) not only for learning and homework but also to seek advice on personal concerns, prompting fresh warnings from the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) that safeguards are failing to keep pace with the technology’s rapid expansion.
Drawing on new data from 10 countries, UNICEF estimates that at least 20 million children have already used AI, with young people adopting the technology at a rate more than three times faster than adults.
Among them, around 13 million children said they use AI to assist with schoolwork and homework, while an estimated two million, roughly one in 10 users, turn to AI for advice about personal worries.
“AI is here. It is a growing part of all of our lives,” UNICEF said in a statement released on Tuesday. “It is already shaping childhood around the world, for better and for worse.”
While AI offers significant opportunities for education, creativity and problem-solving, UNICEF cautioned that understanding of its long-term impact on children’s development, emotional well-being and exposure to online harm is still in its early stages.
“In effect, a generation is growing up inside a global experiment,” the agency said.
The survey also found that many children are aware of AI-related risks. One-third of respondents expressed concern that AI could be used to spread misinformation or facilitate scams, while one in four feared their photos or videos could be manipulated into sexually explicit deepfakes.
UNICEF warned that children are often the first to face the consequences of poorly regulated AI systems, despite having little influence over how the technology is developed or how their personal data is collected and used.
Ahead of the first Global Dialogue on AI Governance, UNICEF called on governments and technology companies to place children’s rights at the centre of AI policymaking.
The agency urged stronger safeguards against AI-enabled sexual exploitation, greater investment in research on AI’s effects on child development, safer and more transparent AI systems, improved digital literacy for children and parents, and expanded access to digital technologies to prevent a widening AI divide.
“The choices made about AI now,” UNICEF said, “will shape children’s safety, privacy, well-being and equal access to opportunities for decades to come.”
