Source: European Parliament
The Commission is concerned about ensuring children are protected online and is, as part of this, working on a common EU approach to age verification.
To this end, a robust EU-harmonised age verification app that is privacy-preserving and easy to use is being developed in cooperation with the Member States via the European Board for Digital Services[1].
This work is part of a set of measures for the protection of minors, including the Digital Services Act art. 28 guidelines and enforcement actions, the action plan against Cyberbullying, and the inquiry on the impact of social media on mental health.
The app will initially allow users to prove that they are over 18 years when accessing online content restricted to adults (e.g. pornography, gambling, online alcohol purchase). It is technically possible and envisaged to extend the app to other age limits.
Mid-July 2025, a white-label app will be made available to Member States, who may then customise and adapt it to their national contexts (e.g. compatibility with national digital infrastructures and legal frameworks, branding and translation) and decide to publish it in the app stores.
This release launches a pilot phase during which the white-label app will be tested and further customised in collaboration with Member States, online platforms and end-users.
5 frontrunner Member States — Denmark, France, Greece, Italy, and Spain — will be the first to take up the technical solution in view of publishing a customised national app on the app stores. The Commission prepares to scale the app to Member States with national implementation strategies.
The European Parliament is kept informed on this and broader actions in this policy area through presentations at the appropriate Committees meetings and structured dialogues.
- [1] https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/dsa-board.