Meta isn’t doing enough to keep kids off Facebook and Instagram, rules EU

Meta is breaching Europe’s Digital Services Act (DSA) rules by failing to prevent children under 13 from using Facebook and Instagram, according to a preliminary decision issued by the European Commission . The Commission announced the ruling on Wednesday after an almost two-year investigation , saying that Meta doesn’t have adequate measures in place to stop under-13s from accessing its services, or to identify and remove those already on its social media platforms. A notable example is that minors can simply enter a false birth date when signing up for Facebook and Instagram to falsely declare they’re over 13 years old — the minimum age outlined in Meta’s own terms and conditions — with no effective controls to verify their real age. “Meta’s own general conditions indicate their services are not intended for minors under 13,” EU tech policy leader Henna Virkkunen said in a statement. “Yet, our preliminary findings show that Instagram and Facebook are doing very little to prevent children below this age from accessing their services.” The available Facebook and Instagram tools for reporting minors under 13 are also “difficult to use and not effective,” according to the Commission, having found that even when an underage user is reported, there is often no follow-up to actually remove the child from the platform. These concerns place Meta in breach of DSA rules that requires it to “diligently identify and mitigate the risks” of under-13s using its platforms. …