EU’s New Internet Law Leaves Kids with Few Alternatives
The proposed EU KIDS ACT would regulate children’s access to everything from social media and online games to video-sharing platforms and AI. But by casting such a wide net, the regulation risks pushing children off the online communities they depend on—without giving thempproach, restricting harmful experiences without cutting children off from valuable online spaces
The European Commission’s proposed EU Keeping Internet Digital Spaces Accountable and Trustworthy (EU KIDS ACT) would impose broad restrictions across the Internet. It would ban children below age 13 from accessing social media and video-sharing platforms. Children ages 13 and 14 would only be allowed to access restricted versions of these services with their guardian’s permission. Given that studies show the underuse of parental controls, with uptake varying from 35 to 51 percent depending on the device, many of these youth will also likely find themselves cut off from many online services.
The EU should regulate demonstrable risks in digital services rather than impose blunt age and time restrictions that could eliminate benefits without evidence that better alternatives exist. Unfortunately, the proposal treats all social media use alike. And it goes well beyond social media, attempting to address nearly every conceivable parental concern about children’s Internet use, from gaming to AI.
When announcing the KIDS ACT, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said that children “need time to get bored, because this is when they have to use their imagination.” The scope of the KIDS ACT, along with nostalgic statements like these, reveals that European officials hold an antiquated view of the online world. The regulation will inadvertently capture a swath of behavior that is not harmful but helpful to children’s development.
First, children will lose out on beneficial uses of online services. For example, livestreaming services such as YouTube Live, TikTok Live and Twitch will fall under “video-sharing platform services.” Users below age 15 could lose access to these services. This is despite the Commission only identifying the risks of children hosting, not watching, live streams in its preliminary report and working document.
Such bans may push children toward alternative screen time that harms their cognition and social development, mainly TV. An Ofcom study of UK audiences revealed that only 55 percent of children ages 4–15 watched TV in 2023, down from 81 percent in 2018, while increasingly using video-sharing platforms like Twitch. Banning these platforms may reverse the trend.
TV is a “passive,” eat-what-you-get activity. This contrasts with ”active” screen time, which involves ongoing user engagement and provides feedback on users’ input, such as video games or community-driven live streaming. While a review of studies suggests that watching TV negatively affects the attention of children ages three to five, active screen time is associated with both positive and negative effects. A study of Egyptian children ages 4.5–6.5 revealed that “passive exposure is far more risky for developing cognitive systems.” Unlike TV, active screen time users enjoy a sense of presence and community, where they can develop shared identities and participate actively in entertainment and education experiences.
Second, children may perversely lose access to offline alternatives. There’s a prevailing myth that without screens children will play safely in green spaces with other children. A review of 23 studies concludes that screen time can both hinder and facilitate outdoor play, and that parents ultimately determine whether children have and use opportunities for outdoor alternatives. Unlike the policymakers proposing this bill, most parents cannot afford expensive private schools, clubs, and safe green spaces for their children to play. The social disparities that come about from income inequality will be exacerbated if policymakers take away online spaces children use without offering in-person alternatives.
In addition, sports teams, dance halls, and music teachers use social networks to advertise, provide updates, and facilitate sign-ups for in-person activities. Other platforms that encourage and reinforce in-person experiences, like Goodreads, Chess.com, Strava, and Spotify, may fall within scope since the KIDS ACT draws from the Digital Markets Act definition of “online social networking services,” which extends to most online communities. Removing these services may demotivate children from reading, playing chess, discovering music, and exercising.
The KIDS ACT will not necessarily lead to more in-person socializing, but children may lose online communities, resort to poorer screen time, and become dangerously isolated. Policymakers should change course in three ways.
Focus on curbing demonstrably harmful content, not specific technologies
Today’s Internet is full of features designed to make platforms more engaging and interactive, such as recommendation systems, infinite discovery, user-generated content and reactions, and live streaming. Whether or not these features are harmful depends on the content, contact with other users, and the context in which they are deployed. The Commission should target demonstrable harms rather than restrict technologies that can also provide meaningful benefits to children.
For example, the KIDS ACT should not ban children below age 15 from accessing live-streaming platforms (subject to guardian approval). Instead, policymakers should address the specific risks of children hosting or viewing live streams, such as a lack of real-time moderation or unsupervised child-adult interactions, and hold platforms accountable for failing to mitigate them. Responsible platforms use a combination of tools to curb live-streaming risks, such as delayed broadcasts (a practice from live TV), chat filters, safe settings, and parental supervision.
Remove blanket restrictions that incentivize poorer use of screens
Screen time is not inherently harmful, and blanket restrictions will incentivize undesirable, passive screen time. For example, the bill would prevent children below age 15 from accessing social media and video-sharing platforms. The proposal also suggests online video games could fall in scope where they have “certain features corresponding to a video sharing platform.” The same may be true if online video games, as many modern games do, share features with social media, such as user-generated content and user-to-user interactions. Children ages 13 and 14 can access these services only with parental supervision and time limits “which shall not exceed one hour per day.”
These restrictions may prevent or limit a child from watching YouTube to help with her math homework, or spending hours socializing with friends through an online video game (which studies suggest has proven cognitive benefits). Both behaviors are likely more beneficial than watching TVfor four hours, which may be their most likely alternative. The proposal’s harshest restrictions should therefore not apply equally across entirely different services and should leave parents maximum discretion to encourage common-sense screen use, rather than mandate strict time limits.
Do not impose restrictions without laying out evidence of better alternatives and guidance
Little evidence suggests that removing children from the Internet improves their mental wellbeing. Doing so may disproportionately affect the most vulnerable children, including those without in-person alternatives and those who face barriers to participation in in-person communities, such as children with disabilities whose campaigners say social media is a ‘lifeline.’
Before implementing further restrictions, policymakers should show how removing children’s online communities will benefit them and what alternatives children across the bloc have access to. Where these alternatives are lacking, the Commission should have a plan for helping Member States provide them.
Putting children in a digital solitary confinement is the easy solution to keep them safe from outside danger. It also isolates them from their social relationships, information, community, and culture. The EU should be cautious about removing things known to benefit children while assuming they will flock to better alternatives. They may instead, as one schoolgirl deadpanned to the BBC, “stare at the wall.”
