The European Commission has signalled that EU countries can set their own legal age for social media access, after the French President Emmanuel Macron announced a plan to ban it nationally for children under 15.
Macron said he will give the EU three months to reach a bloc-wide agreement on the issue, or France will act alone and ban social media for its under 15s, per a Tuesday interview with France 2.
Asked about Macron’s move, Commission spokesperson Thomas Regnier told Euractiv that the decision to set a so-called “digital majority age” — that is, the age under which children require parental consent for their data to be processed — is a Member State competence under the bloc’s data protection rulebook (GDPR).
Tech Commissioner Henna Virkkunen also told reporters last week that blocking social media access for users under 15 would be “challenging” due to the diversity of online platforms. Platforms should prioritise safety in the design of their services and ensure a secure online environment for minors, she added.
“The EU will not consider an EU-wide social media ban,” Regnier also said later on Wednesday.
On Friday, a group of seven EU countries joined forces to urge the Commission to create EU-wide rules on stronger age verification mechanisms to block access to harmful and pornographic websites from minors. Within the group, France, Denmark and Greece all want an EU “digital majority age” to be set at 15.
France is already cracking down on porn due to child protection concerns: top sites had until June 6 to add age checks, prompting Pornhub’s parent company Aylo to block three platforms for French users.
Digital and AI Minister Clara Chappaz told Euractiv that while VPNs can bypass restrictions, the new law makes it much harder for minors to access porn.
“We of course share the same objective as [French] President Macron in the sense that we want to make the online environment a safer place for our kids,” Regnier also said. The EU will continue to enforce the Digital Services Act, an online governance framework that’s intended to protect kids from harmful content, he added.
This is not the first time Macron has advocated for curbing social media access for under 15 year-olds – he already called for restricting access before France’s snap elections last June.
(NL)
