A warning label for social media? Here’s what it could look like

The surgeon general called for a warning label on apps like TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. Four design firms imagine how it could work.

As we’re beginning to quantify exactly how bad social media is for public health, politicians are coming for Big Algorithm. Just this week, the U.S. surgeon general Dr. Vivek Murthy began a campaign to put an official warning label on social media, much like we see on tobacco and alcohol products.

Whether or not he succeeds remains to be seen; Murthy only has the authority to enact a surgeon general’s warning with approval from Congress. But he argues that such a label could be a meaningful design intervention. “Evidence from tobacco studies show that warning labels can increase awareness and change behavior,” he points out in a New York Times op-ed. “When asked if a warning from the surgeon general would prompt them to limit or monitor their children’s social media use, 76 percent of people in one recent survey of Latino parents said yes.”