European Commission set to push social media restrictions, safety requirements into law
The European Commission is proposing legislation to restrict social media access for children under 13 and establish stricter safety measures for minors on platforms. This includes a minimum age of 15 for account creation, parental controls for mini-accounts, and a ban on addictive features and profiling-based recommendations. The proposal is part of a broader effort to combat online harms for young people, following similar initiatives in other countries. However, the plan has faced criticism from tech lobbyists and digital rights advocates who raise concerns about privacy, enforcement challenges, and the potential impact on adult users’ online freedoms.
The European Commission (EC) on Thursday unveiled a comprehensive roadmap for a proposal designed to significantly limit social media access for children and bolster online safety for minors. The initiative, known as the EU KIDS Act, aims to address growing concerns about the detrimental effects of social media on young people’s wellbeing and mental health. The proposal would bar children under 13 from accessing social media platforms and mandate that platforms improve their design to better protect minors.
The legislation would establish a minimum age of 15 for account creation, with children between 13 and 15 only able to access social media through “mini accounts” controlled by their parents. These mini accounts would be subject to strict regulation, including limitations on social contacts and a daily screen time cap of one hour. Children under 13 would be entirely blocked from social media outside of parent-controlled tools designed to limit device use for child-friendly video-sharing services.
Beyond age restrictions, the KIDS Act seeks to remove potentially harmful features from social media platforms. The proposal includes a ban on “addictive features and profiling-based recommender feeds dragging minors into ‘rabbit holes’ of harmful content.” Other restrictions include a ban on “infinite scroll without stopping points, reward tricks and push notifications during sleeping hours, as well as unsolicited contact from strangers.”
To ensure compliance, the proposal mandates that AI companions and chatbots be turned off by default and require them to create protocols to prevent simulating relationships in ways that create emotional dependency. Providers would also be required to keep minors’ profiles private by default, blocking geolocation, microphone and camera access.
The EC will require “very large” providers to submit a “compliance plan” to the EC and a third-party auditor charged with reviewing the companies’ programs for protecting kids online. The EC will review auditor reports and ask providers’ to address deficits when audits reveal lapses, the press release said. Enforcement will be made easier because the continent’s Digital Services Act and the Artificial Intelligence Act have already mandated restrictions that give a foundation to build from. In cases where companies are suspected to be in violation of the KIDS Act, the commission said it will accelerate investigations and ensure they end within 90 days. Online providers who are found to be in violation of the KIDS Act could be fined as much as 6% of their global annual sales, the EC said. Providers also will be required to bankroll regulators’ oversight by paying a fee.
Despite the strong public support for stricter kids online safety laws – with a Special Eurobarometer on the Digital Decade 2026 survey showing that 92% of Europeans consider better kids online safety protections a “top policy priority” – the proposal has faced criticism. Tech lobbyists and digital rights advocates have raised concerns about the technical challenges of implementation, the potential impact on adult users’ online freedoms, and the privacy implications of requiring users to submit ID documents and smartphones for age verification.
“The Commission is kicking those critical decisions down the road to future implementing and delegated acts,” Mitchell Rutledge, CCIA Europe’s technology and security policy manager, said via email. “Europeans are essentially being asked to trust a system before anyone knows how it’s actually going to be built.” Digital freedoms advocates said the proposal is dangerous and imperils the privacy of all Europeans. Simeon de Brouwer, policy advisor at European Digital Rights (EDRi), Europe’s largest network of digital rights organizations, said that if the EU really wants to protect children, it should make platforms prove that they are safe, not make children and everyone else prove that they are old enough to exercise their fundamental rights online. Greta Thunberg could not have launched her global climate change campaign without access to online services, he said.