At a time when the protection of minors online has become a central political issue in many EU countries, on Tuesday 10 February the European Commission unveiled its new plan to tackle cyberbullying, which aims to coordinate European approaches, offer a single reporting platform and focus on prevention and education.
According to the WHO, cyberbullying affects around 15% of teenagers, a figure that has been rising since 2018, with girls being particularly vulnerable. According to the WHO, Instagram and Snapchat are the main channels for cyberbullying, given their popularity with young people.
The European Commission is proposing to set up an app for reporting cases of cyberbullying to a national hotline. The app should also enable “children and young people to easily report cyberbullying, store and submit evidence, and receive tailored assistance”.
The Commission is to draw up a model on which the Member States can then graft and adapt according to their national services. At this stage, the application is not mandatory, and the technical details of the “support” it could provide are not specified.
In the action plan, the Commission also announces that “a group of child protection experts will be tasked with advising the Commission by this summer on Europe-wide age restrictions for social networks”.
This announcement had already been made by the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, last September, but had taken much longer to put together than expected (see EUROPE 13716/7).
The action plan stresses that the expert group will “pave the way for a coordinated, potentially legislative, European approach to age thresholds”, and will include advice on awareness campaigns and on how parents can control their children’s access to social networks.
The Commission says it is making the protection of minors online “a priority”: an online age verification mechanism is already being tested in several EU countries, including France (see EUROPE 13680/15).
DSA is also cited as a potential tool for reinforcing the safety of minors online. The Commission states that the revision of the guidelines on the protection of minors online, scheduled for this year, could include references to the best ways of combating cyberbullying on platforms.
To see the action plan: https://aeur.eu/f/knz (Original version in French by Isalia Stieffatre)