Austria plans to ban social media access for children under the age of 14 by the start of the next school year in the fall, according to Alexander Proll, secretary general of the country’s People’s Party.
“Our goal is to ensure that concrete steps to implement [the ban] are taken before the start of the new school year. The first step, in my opinion, would be to form a group of experts and representatives of political parties. The second – and we are already addressing this issue behind the scenes – is the implementation of specific technical measures and details,” he told the O1 radio station, News.Az reports, citing TASS.
He said that the Austrian government will follow “the example of Australia, where responsibility for enforcing the ban was placed on the platforms themselves.”
Meanwhile, the NEOS party, which is part of the ruling coalition, believes the move goes too far, proposing an alternative: verifying teenagers’ social media accounts through Austria ID, an application that enables people to identify themselves securely online and thus use digital services and carry out transactions. However, technically, such a solution cannot be implemented earlier than 2027, Henrike Brandstotter, a member of the National Council (Austria’s lower house of parliament) from the NEOS party, told the radio station.