Overview

• France, led by Digital Affairs Minister Clara Chappaz, is advocating for mandatory age verification on social media platforms to restrict access for users under 15 years old.
• The government is working to build an EU coalition with Spain, Greece, and Ireland to strengthen the Digital Services Act with binding age-verification requirements.
• If no EU-wide agreement is reached by the start of the school year, France plans to enforce its own domestic age verification measures and sanctions.
• This initiative follows earlier actions, such as ARCOM's enforcement against pornographic websites without age verification and Spain's 2024 law barring under-16s from social media.
• The push is framed as a public health response to rising concerns over youth mental health and harmful online trends like #SkinnyTok.