EU Lawmakers Press Commission on Child Safety as Debate on Age Limit Heats Up

Lawmakers pressed European Commission officials on Wednesday on why existing rules protecting children online are not being enforced, even as the bloc moves toward new legislation setting a minimum age for social media.

The European Parliament’s Internal Market and Consumer Protection Committee held a two-panel hearing that brought together representatives from Meta, BEUC (the European Consumer Organization), the Center for Democracy and Technology Europe, European Digital Rights (EDRi), DOT Europe and Kids Unplugged Belgium.

The session came ahead of an expert panel report, expected around July 13, that will advise the Commission on minimum age thresholds and platform design requirements for minors.

A Commission official said nearly all EU member states called for a harmonized European approach to children's online safety at a ministers' meeting in April, reflecting political pressure that has also driven France, Germany and Belgium to introduce national measures in recent months.

Gaps in age verification

A Kids Unplugged Belgium representative, describing a coalition of tens of thousands of families across Europe and the United Kingdom, called for an EU-wide minimum age of 16 backed by effective age verification, with no parental consent exemptions. She argued commercial incentives always push platforms toward the lowest permissible threshold, making opt-out carve-outs self-defeating. She also called for social media to be treated as a product requiring safety testing before being marketed to children.

Civil society representatives took a different view. One said age verification is routinely circumvented, carries privacy risks and shifts responsibility away from platforms. On age limits specifically, EDRi argued that banning children from social media at 14 or 16 and then releasing them into the same unregulated environment at 18 — with no experience navigating it — risks leaving young people less equipped, not more. The advocacy group said the opportunity to learn should not be taken away, and that adults have a responsibility to empower minors to live in the digital world that has been built for them.

A Commission official told the committee that the EU is developing an age verification architecture intended to be privacy-preserving, acknowledging that guidelines issued a year ago "deliberately" left verification requirements vague because the technology and political readiness were not in place.

The official explicitly cited Australia's experience — including regular exchanges with the eSafety Commissioner — as the reference point for why verification now has to be resolved. "If you haven't had an effective age verification, you're missing an important tool to actually effectively enforce," the official said, describing it as something that now "has to be tackled."

But the official also flagged Australia's limits. An eSafety Commissioner report published in March, the official said, showed "yes, they have an effect — but it's also massive circumvention," adding that the EU needs to design its approach to avoid repeating that outcome.

Enforcement questions

Several MEPs questioned whether the Digital Services Act (DSA), which already imposes obligations on platforms to protect minors, is being adequately enforced.

MEP from Italy Brando Benifei said enforcement has been "far too slow," arguing that platforms have had years to bring their systems into compliance and have not done so. He called for stronger coordination between national regulators and the Commission and for binding timelines on enforcement outcomes.

A Commission official pointed to ongoing investigations into addictive design features and account settings. But the official also acknowledged that regulators, despite last year’s guidance on minor protection, “do not see enough, and that is why we [regulators] have to enforce.”The Commission official added that enforcement action is expected following the expert panel's recommendations.

When an MEP asked whether any investigations specifically target the DSA's existing prohibition on targeted advertising to minors, the Commission did not point to any. A Commission official described the ban as "indeed a prohibition" and said the Commission is "looking at whether we should also extend it to other operators" not currently covered by the DSA.

Towards a harmonized approach

A representative from DOT Europe, an industry coalition representing major online platforms, said its members are already deploying screen time limits, family pairing tools, age-appropriate content settings and wellbeing prompts — and argued that the EU already has "a substantial and sophisticated legal architecture" in the DSA, GDPR, AVMSD and Unfair Commercial Practices Directive that, if enforced, would go far.

Its central concern was fragmentation, given France, Germany, Belgium and other member states are introducing incompatible national age verification systems, block lists and parental consent models that they said amount to "the fragmentation engine," particularly where national regulators classify entire services as harmful to minors outside the DSA's harmonized risk framework.

DOT Europe called on the Commission to enforce existing rules first and ensure any new proposals — including the Digital Fairness Act — do not duplicate or conflict with the DSA.

They also raised a point that some member states are actively discussing how to prevent online providers from scanning private communications for child sexual abuse material, making it legally impossible for platforms to detect CSAM in messaging. "Protection of minors also includes enabling online providers to search for sexual abuse material," they said. "This is currently not possible."

What comes next

The Commission is expected to propose amendments to consumer protection rules before the end of the year, targeting attention-maximizing features such as infinite scroll, non-personalized advertising defaults for minors, and influencer marketing disclosure obligations. A Commission official said the proposals would be "coherent and complementary" to the existing DSA framework.

The expert panel report due July 13 is expected to shape those proposals. Several MEPs and civil society speakers said children themselves are largely absent from the consultation process, and called for their meaningful participation in decisions that directly affect them.