Brussels.- The European Commission (EC) proposed this Thursday the EU KIDS Act, which prohibits children under 13 from accessing social media, sets the minimum age for opening an account at 15, and requires platforms to demonstrate that their services are safe by design.
The proposal is structured around four pillars: delaying access to social media (a ban until age 13, parental mini-accounts from 13 to 15 with a maximum of one hour per day); safety by design (prohibition of infinite scroll, nighttime notifications, and AI chatbots that generate emotional dependency); age verification, and enforcement with mandatory audits and files resolved within 90 days.
Access delay
The regulation establishes a gradual approach by age: a ban on screens before age 3, access only via parental account to children’s video from 3 to 13, parental ‘mini-accounts’ from 13 to 15, and a personal account from that age onwards.
You may be interested in: Ukraine announced sanctions aimed at limiting the broadcast of the children’s series Masha and the Bear
The regulation will apply to social networks, video platforms, online video games, chatbots and artificial intelligence (AI) companions, app stores and operating systems, with non-profit educational services and those operated by public authorities being exempt.
More Read
“Security by design”
The safety-by-design obligations, which apply to all those under 18, prohibit infinite scrolling and define “core sleeping hours” as at least eight consecutive hours between 10:00 PM and 8:00 AM local time, a period during which push notifications are prohibited.
AI companion chatbots must have persistent conversational memory disabled by default for minors and may not simulate interpersonal relationships that generate emotional dependency.
Minor profiles must be private by default, with geolocation, camera, and microphone disabled, which can only be modified from the age of 15 with the minor’s explicit consent. The use of live broadcasts (‘livestreaming’) will also be prohibited by default.
More Read
In video games, the norm prohibits exposing minors to variable reward systems, including “loot boxes,” due to their link to compulsive and gambling-like behaviors.
KIDS Act includes age verification
Platforms must verify age when creating a new account using the EU age verification solution, which does not retain identity documents or biometric data. Self-declaration of age is not considered, on its own, a valid method.
For existing accounts, reasonable indications will suffice, such as the account creation date, without the need for generalized retroactive verification.
