Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez of Spain on Tuesday announced plans to bar anyone under the age of 16 from accessing social media, the latest in a global push to shield children from potential harm caused by online platforms.
“We will protect them from the digital wild west,” Mr. Sánchez said in a speech at the World Governments Summit in Dubai.
Mr. Sánchez said the ban, which needs parliamentary approval, would be part of a series of legislative and regulatory measures pushed by his Socialist-led government. That includes an effort to make company executives legally responsible if illegal or hate-related content is not removed from their platforms, and to criminalize the manipulation of algorithms and the amplification of illegal content.
The goal is to reassert democratic control over social media, Mr. Sánchez said, and to rein in major digital platforms “where laws are ignored, and crimes are tolerated.”
Mr. Sánchez’s announcements echoed growing worries around the world about the impact of social media on children, and it underscored the differences between Europe and the United States on how to define free speech and regulate online platforms.
Last month, Australia became the first country in the world to ban social media for children under 16. Countries including France, Malaysia, Denmark and others are considering or working on similar measures amid growing concerns over online abuse, mental health, and social media addiction.
Some have expressed skepticism about the effects and enforcement of such bans, which critics argue could push children to less well-regulated parts of the internet. Technology companies have also pushed back against the rules.
Mr. Sánchez said on Tuesday that the measures, including the proposed social media ban, would be put into a bill as early as next week.
It is unclear how easily his left-wing coalition, which lacks a majority in Parliament, will be able to pass them. Spain’s main opposition party, the conservative People’s Party, has expressed support for the ban. But the far-right Vox party came out against it.
“This is the government’s priority: securing clientelist networks, ensuring that the media follow the official narrative, and, of course, making sure that no one criticizes them on social media,” Pepa Millán, a spokeswoman for Vox, said at a news conference on Tuesday.
A spokesman for Spain’s ministry of youth and childhood said the social media ban would be introduced by amending a bill on the protection of minors in digital environments that lawmakers are already discussing.
The amendment would raise to 16 the age at which minors can consent to the processing of their personal data — and therefore the age at which they can use social media platforms, the spokesman said. Minors under that age would only be able to access such content with the permission of their legal guardian. The ban would require platforms to institute effective age-verification systems, Mr. Sánchez said.
The ban in Australia requires users to be at least 16 in order to have accounts on the Snapchat, TikTok, Facebook, and other social media services. Last month, Australian regulators said that companies had “removed access” to about 4.7 million accounts belonging to children under 16.
More than 90 percent of Spanish teenagers engage with at least one social network, and one in 10 minors in Spain have experienced cyberbullying, according to a study published in November that was conducted by several organizations, including UNICEF Spain.
Representatives for Google, Meta, Snapchat, TikTok and X did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Spain’s proposed measures.
Mr. Sánchez also said on Tuesday that his government would create a tracking system to quantify and trace what it calls an online “footprint of hate and polarization.” He said Spain had joined five other European countries in a new alliance, the “coalition of the digitally willing” aimed at coordinating faster and stricter enforcement of social media rules across borders, although he did name other alliance members.
Europe has moved more aggressively than the United States to regulate social media, putting it at odds with the Trump administration.
On Tuesday, the police in Paris searched X’s premises in France, and prosecutors issued a summons to the social media company’s owner, Elon Musk, as part of a yearlong investigation into the platform.
That same day, Britain’s data regulator said it was investigating whether X had complied with personal data regulations amid accusations that Grok, the platform’s A.I. chatbot, had spread sexual deepfakes.
Some have warned of government overreach.
“The French raid on X’s offices and Musk’s judicial summons, combined with Sánchez’s proposals to hold platform executives personally liable, follow the playbook Brazil established in 2024 when it blocked X for defying court orders,” said Ekaitz Cancela, a Spanish expert in technological sovereignty, referring to Brazil’s aggressive approach to confronting online platforms.
European countries, he said, are “weaponizing tech policy.”
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