{"id":942127,"date":"2026-05-06T18:55:32","date_gmt":"2026-05-06T18:55:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/942127\/"},"modified":"2026-05-06T18:55:32","modified_gmt":"2026-05-06T18:55:32","slug":"eu-must-go-beyond-binary-yes-or-no-ban-on-social-media-top-official-says-politico","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/942127\/","title":{"rendered":"EU must go beyond \u2018binary yes or no ban\u2019 on social media, top official says \u2013 POLITICO"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Harris-Hess referenced a ministerial meeting in Nicosia last week, where EU capitals <a href=\"https:\/\/pro.politico.eu\/news\/217624\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">aligned on an EU-wide restriction<\/a>, as an indication of the political momentum.<\/p>\n<p>Whatever form a ban takes, if it is decided, it is necessary to discuss \u201cWhat is the environment we want to see for those who can access the service?&#8217; It can\u2019t be nothing, it has to be some form of protection,\u201d for those minors between the lower age set by restrictions and the 18-year-old age of majority, he said.<\/p>\n<p>While saying that legally, an EU-wide ban is a possibility, Harris-Hess rejected the word \u201cban\u201d as \u201cemotionally laden\u201d and said measures would face \u201cpractical difficulties,\u201d as evidenced in Australia.<\/p>\n<p>Canberra introduced an under-16 social media ban last year, which has produced no meaningful changes in\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/pro.politico.eu\/news\/216189\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">platform<\/a>\u00a0behavior or among\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.france24.com\/en\/live-news\/20260430-no-meaningful-shift-from-social-media-sites-after-australia-teen-ban-govt-report\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">children<\/a>, according to the Australian government\u2019s assessments.<\/p>\n<p>Sonia Livingstone \u2014 a professor at the London School of Economics and Political Science who is leading the Commission\u2019s panel of experts \u2014 came out strongly against a blanket ban on the panel, telling POLITICO that age restrictions are not easy to define or implement.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe ban sounds simple, and it isn\u2019t,\u201d she said. \u201cWhat will we ban? Which services? How will we ban them? What will we provide for children when we have banned them? How will we even know if we have banned them? And what about the children who find the workarounds? Aren\u2019t they even more at risk? So it&#8217;s not the simple route,\u201d Livingstone said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Harris-Hess referenced a ministerial meeting in Nicosia last week, where EU capitals aligned on an EU-wide restriction, as&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":942128,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5174],"tags":[186,8612,2438,12495,3677,21469,7964,2000,299,5187,36,1450,2452,218,7965,811,1199,182,413,104],"class_list":{"0":"post-942127","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-eu","8":"tag-australia","9":"tag-cyprus","10":"tag-department","11":"tag-development","12":"tag-digital","13":"tag-digital-services-act","14":"tag-enforcement","15":"tag-eu","16":"tag-europe","17":"tag-european","18":"tag-france","19":"tag-greece","20":"tag-media","21":"tag-mental-health","22":"tag-platforms","23":"tag-security","24":"tag-services","25":"tag-social-media","26":"tag-space","27":"tag-spain"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116529157062812420","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/942127","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=942127"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/942127\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/942128"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=942127"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=942127"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=942127"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}