A note on psychological harm as a policy instrument

Psychological harm is real, can be severe, and may be caused by many factors, including products with internet connectivity. The question as to whether preventing psychological harm should be used as a policy imperative is, however, a difficult one. We discuss two problematic issues related to that question. The first is the difficulty of objectively assessing psychological harm, and the associated possibility of fraud. The second is the unpredictability of psychological harm in others, which makes preventing it virtually impossible.