The European Commission on Thursday proposed restricting social media access for children under the age of 13, while allowing those aged up to 15 to use the platforms through accounts monitored by their parents.
The plan would be supported by a free, open-source age-verification application developed by the European Union. The tool would allow social media platforms to confirm whether users meet a specified age requirement without disclosing their identities, according to Reuters.
The proposal will need approval from both EU member states and the European Parliament before it can be formally adopted as law.
The introduced the smartphone-based application in April this year and is gradually deploying it across EU member states. Cyprus, Denmark, France, Greece, Ireland, Italy and Spain are currently participating in the pilot programme, with the Commission aiming to make the tool available throughout the European Union by the end of 2026.
The application will also allow users to demonstrate that they are over 18 when accessing adult websites, in line with age restrictions already established under the Digital Services Act ().
Under the proposed Kids Act, platforms that fail to comply with rules protecting minors could face enforcement under the DSA. The legislation allows for fines of up to 6% of a company’s worldwide annual turnover.
The European Commission will oversee the development of the software and technical standards, while the verification system itself will operate on a decentralised model. Individual member states will administer the system through designated issuers, while age-verification credentials will remain stored on users’ smartphones. The setup is designed to avoid creating a central EU database containing users’ ages or records showing who has undergone verification.
Under the proposed system, users would verify their age once through an issuer authorised by their national government. The designated organisation could be a digital identity service, bank or post office. When accessing a platform or website with an age restriction, the app would then confirm whether the user meets the required age limit, without sharing their exact age or identity with the service.
The process separates the organisation issuing the age credential from the platform checking it. The issuer would not know where or when the verification is used, while each credential would be valid for only a single use, making it harder to track a user across different services. The system would not store identity documents or biometric information, and its open-source code would allow outside experts to examine how it works.
The EU’s approach differs from systems that leave social media companies to create their own age-checking mechanisms. Instead, it seeks to establish a common verification framework that can be used across platforms and member states.
“Online platforms can easily rely on our age verification app. So there are no more excuses,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said.
Ursula von der Leyen stated the bloc had examined Australia’s approach while preparing the proposal. Australia introduced a use for children under 16 last year but did not specify a particular verification method or establish a government-run system. Instead, individual platforms were left to enforce the requirement themselves, relying on commercial age-verification providers.
A Reuters-reported trial found that none of the platforms tested asked for proof of age from 50 accounts that identified their users as 16 years old. Since then, the Australian government has increased the maximum penalties twofold and warned that it could pursue legal action against platforms that fail to comply.
If approved, the proposed Kids Act would establish the world’s largest social media age restriction, potentially affecting around 450 million people across the EU’s 27 member states.
France’s Constitutional Council last month rejected a proposed national ban on social media access for children under 15, ruling that the measure was unconstitutional and disproportionately restricted freedom of expression.
The decision highlights the ongoing legal debate over such age restrictions and suggests that national courts could play an important role in determining how the -wide rules are ultimately applied.
Greece, which is working on legislation to prevent children under 15 from accessing social media, said it expects “clear convergence” with the EU proposal. The country is targeting the beginning of next year for its own rules to come into force.
In Spain, a proposed ban on social media access for those under 16 is still awaiting a vote in Parliament. Digital Transformation Minister Oscar Lopez said age-verification measures need to “strike a balance with the right to privacy”.
Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, meanwhile, said the message to the “techno-oligarchs” is that “childhood is protected by our democracies”.
(With inputs from agency)
