Parliament backs stronger protection and a better online environment for young people
The European Parliament has adopted a report prepared by the Committee on Culture and Education on the impact of social media and the online environment on young people, backing key Renew Europe demands for safer online platforms.
Public debate has recently concentrated heavily on screen time, age limits and parental controls. It often overlooks how strongly platforms shape young people’s behaviour. The report targets the design choices behind the risks young people face online. Platforms decide what appears next on screen and how long users keep scrolling. These choices serve business models built around holding attention.
Renew Europe strongly backed protections built directly into platforms, including measures to disable targeted advertising and constrain addictive design features. The report also calls for mandatory safe settings for recommender systems, including prominent alternatives that do not rely on profiling. It urges platforms to switch off autoplay and limit infinite scrolling and notifications.
Renew Europe’s shadow rapporteur MEP Hristo Petrov (We Continue the Change, Democratic Bulgaria/Bulgaria) played a key role in shaping the final compromise, securing a balanced and pragmatic approach that combines stronger protection with young people’s rights to learn, communicate and participate online.
“Children should not be expected to compete with algorithms designed to keep them scrolling. Right now, the responsibility to protect them falls on parents, who have to find the right settings or install an app to make sure they know what their children watch. This report puts responsibility back on the platforms, because they are the ones designing, deploying, and profiting from the apps and algorithms. Protection has to be built in and switched on by default.”
MEP Hristo Petrov
Renew Europe also secured recommendations on video games and artificial intelligence. The report highlights the risks of loot boxes and asks for gambling content in live streams to be clearly labelled. On AI, it calls for dedicated child and youth impact reviews before products are made available.
Renew Europe has ensured that education and media literacy run through the report’s recommendations, so that young people learn to engage critically with what they encounter online and to switch off when they need to. Parents and teachers are expected to guide and protect children but often lack support and preparation themselves. The report therefore calls for improved training and support to help create a safer and more supportive environment for young people.
Parliament also calls for greater platform accountability and asks the Commission to consider personal liability in cases of serious and persistent breaches of the Digital Services Act provisions protecting minors.
Renew Europe successfully defended young people’s access to factual, science based and age-appropriate information, including information on sexual and reproductive health and rights. Renew Europe also successfully defended access to the online environment and additional measures for children in vulnerable situations, including enhanced content moderation training, fair representation, awareness-raising campaigns and rapid, affordable and geographically accessible mental health and psychological support services.
“The online world is where a great many young people learn, create, organise and find each other. It is our job is to make it safe for them. It takes bold measures to prevent screen dependency, so that children still have time to sleep, play sport and see their friends offline, combining the best of both worlds.”
MEP Hristo Petrov
