Greece is emerging as a leading player in the developments regarding social media and their effect on minors. By promoting coordinated actions to tackle digital addiction, our country has taken the lead in reducing a phenomenon that affects the mental health of young people. And not only at the national level, since the Greek government has been taking initiatives for almost three years now to formulate a unified European policy to curb a phenomenon that has taken the form of a torrent, sometimes more and sometimes less damaging to the physical and mental development of a young person. A young man who is trapped in a scroll, unaware of what is happening around him, losing himself and altering his personality.
In this context, Greece, from the raising of the issue at the international level by Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis at the UN, to the national strategy and the interventions of the Minister of Digital Governance Dimitris Papastergiou at the European level, is seeking to establish rules for the protection of minors in the digital environment. Through initiatives that combine technology, political will and transnational cooperation, Greece is attempting to lay the foundations for a safer digital environment for future generations.
Central elements of this effort are age verification, the development of tools such as Kids Wallet, cooperation with platforms, and the development of a common European framework in cooperation with the European Commission.
“From 1 January 2027, a central government option announced by Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis will be implemented to effectively protect children from the uncontrolled use of social media. Platforms from that date onwards will not be able to give access to children under the age of 15 and will have to ensure this with reliable mechanisms. They already have the tools to identify the age of users, either from the information provided or from their activity, and this is something that should now be put into practice. Greece, on the initiative of the Prime Minister, is one of the first countries to adopt this regulation, sending a clear message that protecting minors in the digital environment is not an option but an obligation. At the same time, we as a State are developing the necessary tools, such as Kids Wallet, to provide secure and reliable age verification, but the burden of implementation lies with the platforms themselves, which are required to comply with the new framework,” said the Minister of Digital Governance, Dimitris Papastergiou.
The milestones of Greek initiatives
The path towards the formation of this framework was not instantaneous, but the result of successive interventions and initiatives that unfolded at national, European and international level. From the emergence of the issue on the global agenda to the specification of technical solutions and the institutionalisation of specific tools, the Greek strategy has evolved through specific milestones. The most important of these reflect the gradual transition from the identification of the problem to the establishment of a coherent and applicable framework for the protection of minors in the digital environment.
September 2024: The starting point for this effort is September 2024, when the Prime Minister raised the issue at the international level during his speech at the 79th Session of the UN General Assembly in New York. This intervention signaled Greece’s intention to place the problem on a broader, global agenda.
December 2024: A few months later, the National Strategy for the Protection of Minors from Internet Addiction was presented. This strategy formed the basis for a series of measures focusing on both prevention and regulation of children’s access to digital services.
June 2025: Greek intervention at European level was also decisive. At the Council of Telecommunications Ministers in Luxembourg, an initiative was presented that focused on the design of safer digital systems, the establishment of reliable age verification methods and the definition of “digital adulthood”. The proposal received support from 13 member states, reinforcing the momentum for a common European policy.
In the same context, the European Commission announced its intention to introduce a transitional “mini wallet” for age verification, until the full implementation of the European digital wallet in 2026. This approach is directly linked to the Greek proposal for the “Kids Wallet”, a tool that aspires to become a key mechanism for the protection of minors online.
June 2025: The Greek initiative seems to have found a response from the private sector as well, as major digital platforms (Meta) expressed their support for the idea of a single digital age of majority. At the same time, the Ministry of Digital Governance has taken immediate action, such as sending letters to the platforms, asking for their cooperation in implementing age verification techniques.
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October 2025: The autumn marked the further deepening of the Greece-European Commission cooperation, with the presentation of the integration of European technical standards in the “Kids Wallet”. This development highlighted Greece as a pilot country in the implementation of child protection practices.
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November 2025: The Ministry of Digital Governance sent a letter to platforms on age verification and protection of minors. The letter was intended to inform the major digital “players” in general about Greece’s plans for the protection of minors in the digital environment, focusing in particular on the technical implementation of age verification across all online platforms.
April 2026: The culmination of the initiatives came with the presentation of a new regulatory framework for minors’ access to social networks. This framework combines health, technology and public administration policies, reflecting a holistic approach to the issue.
April 2026: In the same period, the Greek government stepped up its diplomatic pressure on the European Union, proposing the development of a single European framework for the protection of children from digital addiction.
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