Thousands of Scottish children have admitted to being bullied online with many unable to stop posting on social media amid fears their devices “are designed to be addictive”.

The findings come amid calls for a national agency to help young people remove unsavoury content or other aspects of their 'digital footprint' in later life.

A survey of more than 1,675 young people aged 18 or under in Scotland found 59 per cent had been bullied or knew someone who had been bullied online. More than two thirds (69%) believe that some technology products and services have been designed to be addictive and 59% of young people said their family had tried to limit the amount of time they spend on the Internet – with Facebook the website most likely to be banned by parents and carers.

The survey was carried out by the Young Scot 5Rights Youth Commission, which was set up to explore how children's rights can be protected better online in Scotland. The group called for ministers to promote five digital rights - the right to know what data is held about them, the right to remove content, the right to safety and support, the right to 'informed' use and the right to digital literacy.

Dev Kornish, 16, said it was about transferring existing child rights to a digital world. "Young people told us they were concerned many products are designed specifically to exploit young people and programmed so that young people want to use them more," she said.

"When your phone screen is constantly coming on with notifications, and other stimuli making you want to keep using it, people do feel as if they are being controlled by the design of the device."

Even staff at companies like Google, Twitter and Facebook, when they met with members of the commission, had talked about being addicted to mini games on platforms like Messenger, she said. "It is not just young people who are affected, but young people are the main target audience for mobile phones and social media platforms."

A central agency could help make it easier for a young person to remove embarrassing or out of date information about them online she said. "At present things are often never truly deleted - but I'm not the person I was at 13 and I don't want what I posted then to represent me. Having everything in one place could help people exercise a right to remove data about them without fuss."

Emma McFarlane, from the 5Rights Youth Commission, said 'digital natives' who have grown up using the internet, no longer regard their online and off-line lives as separate: “For society to move forward in realising the rights of young people, it is no longer appropriate to view online and offline as two exclusive and separate entities," she said. "As young people’s lives, careers and education continue to become more and more digitalised, it is important that the government continues to prioritise the 5Rights and embed them in our society.”

Louise Macdonald, Chief Executive of Young Scot, said: “Growing up in a truly digital world, these young people offer poignant, first-hand insight into how rights can be respected both on and offline.”

The Commission was launched in February last year by the then children's minister Aileen Campbell. Its work has already contributed to the Scottish Government’s Digital Strategy and National Action Plan on Internet Safety for Children and Young People.

The Conservatives recently announced plans to give teenagers legal powers to strip their pictures, blogs and content from the web when they reach 18.