European Parliament committee calls for stricter online protection measures for minors
The European Parliament’s Internal Market and Consumer Protection Committee (IMCO) has adopted a report calling for stronger EU measures to protect minors online. Approved by 32 votes to five, with nine abstentions, the report urges an EU-wide digital minimum age of 16 for access to social media, video-sharing platforms, and AI companions without parental consent, and a minimum age of 13 for general social media use. It supports the European Commission’s efforts to develop privacy-preserving age assurance systems but emphasises that platforms remain responsible for ensuring safety-by-design. The Committee calls on the Commission to fully enforce the EU Digital Services Act, including fines or bans for non-compliant platforms, and proposes introducing personal liability for senior management in repeated breaches, banning engagement-based recommender algorithms and addictive features for minors, and prohibiting gambling-like mechanisms and ‘kidfluencing.’It also seeks to regulate manipulative technologies such as targeted ads, influencer marketing, and dark patterns under the forthcoming Digital Fairness Act. The initiative follows Eurobarometer findings on young people’s increasing reliance on digital media, with the European Parliament due to vote on the recommendations at the 24–27 November 2025 plenary session.