EU Moves to Ban Social Media for Under-13s

The European Union will ban social media for children under 13 and allow only limited, supervised access until the age of 15, under plans unveiled on Wednesday by European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen, according to The Local Italy. Von der Leyen framed the move with the phrase 'Europe has power to act', presenting it as a bloc-wide intervention rather than a national one.

The proposal is the most direct attempt yet by Brussels to regulate how minors use large platforms. The Local Italy's report describes a two-tier structure: an outright bar below 13, and a supervised regime between 13 and 15. The detail of how age would be verified, and which platforms fall inside the definition of social media, is not set out in the report.

For Milan the proposal is a business story as much as a regulatory one. The city is the base for a significant share of Italy's advertising, publishing and digital-media sales, and platforms' European advertising rules have a habit of being written in Brussels and priced in Milan. The Local Italy does not quantify the effect on Italian advertising revenue, and no figure should be assumed.