Age assurance across Europe: how countries are safeguarding minors online (EUROPA)

An Aug 2025 news article that isn't news on the "European strategy for a better internet for kids (BIK+ strategy) is the EU's guiding framework for creating a safer and better online environment for children and young people... keeping children safe from harmful and inappropriate content... established as a legal requirement through a series of laws at the EU level"

Sets out the relevant laws:

• DSA: "specific articles outlining required measures for online platforms accessed by children ... platforms must ensure high levels of privacy, safety, and security for minors online and avoid profiling-based ads ... largest platforms (>45mmu in the EU) must also conduct thorough risk assessments ... implement tailored mitigation strategies to address identified risks ... changes in design, content moderation, and the availability of supportive tools for minors"
• DFA (Digital Fairness Act): "strengthen protection and digital fairness for consumers in areas that are not covered by the DSA ... specific challenges ... harmful practices ... such as deceptive or manipulative interface design, misleading marketing by social media influencers, addictive design ... unfair personalisation ... especially where consumer vulnerabilities are exploited for commercial purposes... pay particular attention to the protection of minors
• GDPR Art. 8 sets 16 as the age for consent... EU Member States can lower ... [to] 13 ... [without consent] processing ... personal data, and with that their access to digital services and platforms online, requires parental consent... no specific rules about children's data processing [but] controllers must make sure that children's data are well protected."
• AVMSD requires video-sharing platforms "to protect minors from [content]... which may impair their physical, mental or moral development". The worse the content, the stricter the control measures, which include age verification systems.

Under "DSA and the protection of minors: age verification as vital solution...

• [see] Guidelines on the protection of minors under the DSA... privacy-, safety- and security-by-design approach ... grounded in children’s rights... set out a non-exhaustive list of measures... recommend ... effective age verification methods ... to restrict access to adult content
• enforcement: "national Digital Service Coordinators (DSCs) ... supervising, enforcing, and monitoring... [this] "responsibility is shared between the DSCs and the European Commission [for] very large online platforms and search engines"
• "age verification blueprint ... provides the technical basis for a user-friendly and privacy-preserving age verification method across the EU. This open-source technology aims to enable users to prove they are over the age of 18 ... without having to reveal any other personal information... will be interoperable with future European Digital Identity (EUDI) Wallets... Five countries – Denmark, France, Greece, Italy and Spain – will be the first to test the technical solution.
• annual BIK Policy monitor provides a comprehensive review of the implementation of the BIK+ strategy across all EU Member States...