Commission holds first meeting of Special Panel on child safety online

This article is brought to you in association with the European Commission.

Today, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen hosted the first meeting of the Special Panel on child safety online. The panel, announced in the 2025 State of the Union address, will provide expert recommendations to better protect and empower children online and will explore the need for potential harmonised age restrictions to access social media.

President Ursula von der Leyen said: “For decades, we have made the real world safer for children and we must do the same in the digital world. The positive opportunities that technology offers cannot come at the cost of their safety, health or happiness. In Europe, tech platforms already have a responsibility to ensure the safety of users and we will continue to ensure they do so. But we must also do more to protect and empower our young people online. That is why I have convened this panel: to forge a strong, realistic, European approach to keep our children safe in the digital age.”

The panel is co-chaired by Maria Melchior, Director of the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research (INSERM) and Professor Dr Jörg M. Fegert, Director of the Department for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Psychotherapy at Ulm University Medical Centre. The different panel meetings will include youth representatives alongside specialists from various fields, such as health, computer science, child rights and digital literacy.

Today’s first meeting examined the current evidence related to the risks and benefits from children’s use of social media and other online activities, such as gaming, messaging apps or Artificial Intelligence. The participants focussed on the responsibility of tech companies, and discussions revolved around several points, including age-appropriate safety by design, addictive features and algorithms, as well as digital literacy for children, their parents and teachers. Participants also discussed existing measures taken within the EU and in third countries.

The next panel meetings will consider the advantages for minors in accessing online spaces, assessing how existing approaches can prevent risks and harms without jeopardising these benefits. The perspectives of young people, children, parents and educators, as expressed in President von der Leyen‘s Youth Advisory Board and the Safer Internet Forum, will be a key part of the discussions on the possible approaches to placing limits on social media use.

The Special Panel will meet on several occasions as of March 2026 with a view to presenting recommendations to the Commission President by the summer.

Next steps

The second meeting is expected to take place in the coming months and will explore possible policy options. The Panel aims to present a report with recommendations to the Commission President by summer 2026.

Background

In her 2025 State of the Union address, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced that she will commission a panel of experts to advise her on the best approach for Europe on child safety online and potential age restrictions for social media.

The panel will consider a range of issues building on the world’s most comprehensive toolbox for the protection of minors. This includes the Digital Services Act (DSA) and its Guidelines on the protection of minors, the Safer Internet Centres under the Better Internet for Kids Strategy (BIK+), as well as the newly adopted Cyberbullying Action Plan and the Communication on a comprehensive approach to mental health. The EU is also advancing rules to combat child sexual abuse online, including finalising measures to protect minors from exploitation.

The Commission has already developed an EU Age Verification app, which will serve as the reference standard for a user-friendly and privacy-preserving age verification method, fully interoperable with the future EU Digital Identity Wallets. This age verification is app is currently being tested in five Member States: Denmark, Greece, Spain, France and Italy.  

It will also draw on feedback from the Citizens’ Panels and the President’s Youth Advisory Board, which submitted their views to the President in January 2026. 

For more information

Digital Services Act

EU Learning Corner