EU Commission issues guidance on Digital Services Act child safety obligations
Guardii Analysis
The European Commission published guidance on 24 September 2024 clarifying how very large online platforms and search engines must comply with Digital Services Act obligations to protect minors from harmful content, including child sexual abuse material and grooming. The guidance specifies that platforms must assess systemic risks to children, implement age-appropriate design measures, and deploy proactive detection technologies, with designated coordinators empowered to impose penalties for non-compliance including fines of up to six percent of global turnover.
A Meta Business Partner with real-time detection modules for grooming, sextortion and AI-generated CSAM, Guardii operates across Instagram, Snapchat, Discord and Roblox to identify harmful patterns in direct messages as they develop, blocking hostile contact before it reaches the target and surfacing escalation, coercion and acute distress signals to parents, schools and authorities. By reporting the shape and seriousness of a conversation rather than its content, the platform enables proportionate intervention without creating a feed of private messages, meeting systemic risk obligations while preserving user privacy at scale.