European Commission issues guidance on age verification under Digital Services Act

The European Commission on 2 September issued guidance to very large online platforms and search engines on their obligations under the Digital Services Act to protect minors, including requirements for age verification, content recommendation transparency and risk mitigation measures tailored to children. The guidance, which applies to services with over 45 million monthly users in the EU, specifies that platforms must take reasonable steps to verify the age of users, restrict minors' exposure to harmful content and advertising, and ensure that algorithmic systems do not amplify risks to children. Platforms are expected to deploy proportionate technical measures, with the Commission noting that age assurance may include self-declaration, device-based estimation or third-party verification depending on the level of risk, and that enforcement action may follow if measures are deemed inadequate.

Verification establishes who may access a service but does not reveal what happens within it. A child confirmed to be of permissible age remains exposed to grooming, sextortion and solicitation of child sexual abuse material in private conversation, harms that unfold after authentication and outside the view of traditional content moderation. Guardii's real-time detection modules for Instagram, Snapchat, Discord and Roblox identify sustained targeting, coercion and escalation in direct messages, surfacing harmful patterns without generating transcripts, blocking or flagging hostile contact before it reaches the target, and alerting a parent, school or professional when a conversation enters acute risk. The approach complements age verification by addressing the underlying harms that occur within age-appropriate accounts, detecting threat at the point of contact rather than relying on post-incident reporting.