EU weighs new child safety rules for social media and AI

A special panel of experts on child safety online delivered its final report to the European Commission in July 2026, pushing Brussels toward a possible common EU age limit for social media and tighter rules for AI tools used by children. The panel was created by Commission President Ursula von der Leyen after her 2025 State of the Union address, met three times between March and June 2026, and was co-chaired by Dr. Maria Melchior of the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research and Prof. Dr. Jörg M. Fegert of Ulm University Medical Centre.

The report lands on top of rules the Commission already put in place under the Digital Services Act. On 14 July 2025, Brussels published guidelines for protecting minors online that call for private-by-default accounts for children, changes to recommender systems to reduce harmful content, stronger blocking and reporting tools, and the disabling of features such as streaks, autoplay and push notifications that can drive heavy use. The same guidelines recommend safeguards for AI chatbots and say age-assurance methods should be accurate, reliable, robust, non-intrusive and non-discriminatory. They apply to online platforms accessible to minors, except micro and small enterprises.

Age verification is moving from theory to rollout. On 29 April 2026, the Commission urged European Union countries to speed up deployment of the EU age verification app and said it should be available by the end of 2026. The app is designed to let users prove their age without sharing unnecessary personal data, and Brussels says it can work as a standalone tool or be integrated into European Digital Identity Wallets. Age verification can be appropriate where national law sets a minimum age for certain online services, including categories of social media.

The Commission preliminarily found Meta in breach of Digital Services Act rules for failing to prevent children under 13 from using Instagram and Facebook. That finding has collided with pressure from member states that are moving at different speeds. At least a dozen European countries have enacted or are considering minimum age limits for social media, usually between 13 and 16. Spain has proposed a ban for under-16s, and France has moved toward prohibiting social media use for children 15 and under.