Spain plans to prohibit social media access for children under 16 starting this year, as announced by Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez on Tuesday at the World Governments Summit in Dubai.
Sánchez said the ban will be introduced as early as next week through amendments to existing legislation on protecting minors in digital environments currently being debated in parliament.
The measure aims to shield young people from what the Spanish leader called a digital environment filled with addiction, abuse, pornography, manipulation, and violence. Platforms will be required to implement effective age verification systems to enforce the restriction, not just simple checkboxes that can be easily bypassed.
Europe's Growing Push for Age Restrictions
Spain becomes the latest European country to pursue social media age restrictions following Australia's historic ban implemented in December 2025, which became the first global prohibition of its kind, according to the New York Times.
France approved legislation in January 2026 to ban social media for children under 15, set to take effect at the start of the school year in September. Denmark and the United Kingdom are also considering similar measures, as countries worldwide express growing concerns about the mental health impacts and online dangers facing children on digital platforms.
The proposed Spanish ban is part of a broader regulatory crackdown on technology companies. Sánchez announced his government will also introduce legislation to hold social media executives criminally liable for failing to remove illegal or hateful content from their platforms.
The government plans to criminalize the algorithmic manipulation and amplification of illegal content, with Sánchez stating that spreading hate must come with consequences. He criticized major platforms for allowing illegal content, including child sexual abuse materials and nonconsensual sexual deepfake images, Reuters reported.
Broader Protections and International Coordination
The legislation raises the minimum age for minors to provide consent for processing their personal data from 14 to 16 years old, aligning with the upper limit allowed under European Union data protection regulations.
Children under 16 will only be permitted to access social media platforms with explicit parental authorization. The draft law also requires mandatory parental control tools on electronic devices and introduces digital restraining orders to protect minors from online harassment.
Sánchez revealed that Spain has joined five other unnamed European nations in what he called a coalition of countries committed to enforcing stricter and faster regulation of social media platforms.
The group plans to meet in the coming days to discuss coordinated cross-border enforcement efforts. The prime minister emphasized that protecting children from digital harms represents a battle that exceeds the boundaries of any single country.
The legislation faces parliamentary approval from Sánchez's left-leaning coalition, which does not hold a majority. Spain's conservative People's Party has expressed support for the ban, while the far-right Vox party opposes the measure.
According to studies, over 90 percent of Spanish teenagers use at least one social networking site, and one in ten minors in Spain has experienced cyberbullying. Implementation details and enforcement mechanisms remain under discussion as the legislation moves through the approval process, as per ABC News.
