Changes to Google Age based settings

Hello Administrator,

We are reaching out to remind you to indicate which users in your K-12 institution are 18 years of age or older via the age-based access setting in the Admin Console prior to Sept 1, 2021 to prevent users, such as teachers or staff, from losing access to services.

Age-based Access Setting

After Sept 1, 2021, any users in your domain that you did not indicate as 18 and older will default to the under 18 account setting. All users under 18 will have a more restricted experience with their Workspace accounts when using Additional Google services.

• Teachers & Staff: it is especially important that you configure this setting for Teachers & Staff who are 18 and older to prevent these users from losing access to aspects of Additional Google services (e.g. teaching content created on YouTube) or losing access to some services entirely.

• Users under 18: These users will lose access to some Additional Google Services including, but not limited to:

  • Blogger

  • Google Cloud Platform

  • Location History

  • Play Books Partner Center

  • Here is the full list of restrictions and services that will no longer be available for users under 18.

• Google Services without an on/off switch: Starting September 1, 2021, Google services without a specific on/off control will be unavailable for under 18 users. Administrators will only be able to enable services that are identified by a specific on/off control for users under 18.

• Help your <18 users download their data: As an administrator, you can turn Google Takeout on or off for users and encourage users to download their data using Google Takeout prior to September 1, 2021. After this date, data that your users have lost access to may be deleted. Learn more about all the restrictions and services that will no longer be available for users under 18. Services may also contact end users directly regarding changes in their access to the service.

What do I need to do?

Please update the age-based access settings in your Admin console to indicate all users above the age of 18 (i.e. teachers, staff) before September 1, 2021.

How to set age-based access settings for users:

1. Go to the Admin Console.

2. Under “Accounts”> “Account Settings”, go to "Age-based access” setting.

3. For each organizational unit or group on the left-hand side, indicate whether the organizational unit or group contains users above the age of 18.*

When setting the age-based access setting, please note:

• *Do not select "All users are 18 or older" for organizational units that contain any users under the age of 18. Learn more about how to set age-based access to Additional Google services.

• If no action is taken by September 1, 2021, all users (including teachers, staff) in K-12 domains will default to the under 18 experience, meaning that they will have restricted access to additional Google services and will no longer be able to access services without on/off controls.

• Once completing the steps above, we’d also recommend verifying your school type designation in Admin Console to ensure that it is correct.

We’re here to help

For technical questions and assistance, please contact Google Workspace support and reference issue number 188088298.

For compliance and data protection related questions, sign in to the Admin console to contact Google’s Cloud Data Protection Team (using the form under ‘Account settings > Legal & Compliance’, reference issue number 188088298 in the field ‘Description’).

If parents and guardians have additional questions and want to contact Google directly, they can reach out to us through this contact form.

Sincerely,

The Google Workspace Team