French Senate passes bill that would ban children under 15 from social media

The French Senate voted in favor of a social media ban for children under age 15, putting the country on track to potentially be the first European nation to follow Australia's lead in passing such a law.

The Tuesday vote comes as countries across Europe are increasingly taking steps to implement social media bans.

French President Emmanuel Macron has been a staunch supporter of the legislation, saying in January that the emotions of children and teens should not be “for sale or manipulated by American platforms and Chinese algorithms.”

The French National Assembly passed legislation in January that requires social media companies to turn away new users under age 15 and erase existing accounts belonging to that age group, according to local news reports.

The Senate bill is different and creates a system that divides platforms into two categories. One category would be designated for platforms believed to cause “physical, mental or moral development" to children. An outright ban would apply to those platforms. 

The second category would be for platforms found to be less detrimental that can be used by children under 15 whose parents consent. 

The Senate bill also carves out an exception for online encyclopedias and educational platforms, the local news reports said.

The European Union has been pushing bloc-wide reforms that would make it harder for young teens to access social media.

The European Parliament proposed a non-binding resolution in November, saying children under 16 should not be able to access social media along with AI companions and video-sharing platforms without parental consent. They suggested a ban for children under age 13 regardless of whether a parent consents.

In February, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said his government plans to protect children from the “digital Wild West.” He said he intends to bar children under age 16 from accessing social media. He also plans to require platforms to verify users’ ages. Around the same time, the Dutch government said it wanted to raise the minimum age for social media access in Europe to 15.

In January, the British government announced it was mulling whether to ban children under age 16 from accessing social media. Prime Minister Keir Starmer wrote at the time that “being a child should not be about constant judgement from strangers or the pressure to perform for likes.” 

More recently, the British government announced that it is conducting a pilot program to test different reforms for social media access with hundreds of British families. The pilots are part of a government-run consultation meant to determine possible social media restrictions that began on March 2. The British government has said the consultation will end on May 26 and a decision will be announced shortly thereafter.