Spain and Greece on Tuesday proposed bans on social media use by youngsters as attitudes hardened in Europe in opposition to expertise some say is designed to be addictive, and the measures introduced by Spain’s Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez, drew fury from Elon Musk.
Spain needs to prohibit social media for under-16s, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez stated. Greece is near asserting an identical ban for kids underneath 15, a senior authorities supply stated.
However Sanchez additionally stated his authorities would create a regulation to carry social media executives personally liable for hate speech on their platforms.
The world’s richest man and proprietor of X, previously Twitter, reacted to socialist chief Sanchez’s measures affecting social media platforms. “Soiled Sánchez is a tyrant and a traitor to the folks of Spain,” he wrote on X.
About an hour and a half later, he escalated his criticism, posting on X: “Sánchez is the true fascist totalitarian.”
Representatives of Google, a part of Alphabet, TikTok, Snapchat and Meta didn’t instantly reply to requests for touch upon Spain’s proposed measures.
Spain and Greece be part of nations resembling Britain and France in contemplating more durable stances on social media, after Australia in December turned the primary nation to ban entry to such platforms for kids youthful than 16.
Governments and regulators worldwide are trying on the influence of kids’s display screen time on their growth and psychological wellbeing.
“Our kids are uncovered to an area they have been by no means meant to navigate alone … We’ll not settle for that,” Sanchez stated on the World Governments Summit in Dubai. “We’ll shield them from the digital Wild West.”
The Australia ban “leaves vital gaps that might undermine its targets,” together with limitations in age verification expertise and customers switching to unregulated messaging apps, Snapchat stated in an announcement on Monday.
Spain joins 5 different European nations that he dubbed the “Coalition of the Digitally Prepared” to coordinate and implement cross-border regulation, Sanchez stated, with out naming the nations, set to carry their first assembly within the coming days.
“We all know that this can be a battle that far exceeds the boundaries of any nation,” he stated. His workplace didn’t reply to a request for clarification.
Laws to ban kids underneath 15 from social media is at present passing via France’s parliament. Britain can also be contemplating related measures.
Spain’s proposed regulation would give dad and mom clear backing to set limits and would ease social stress for kids apprehensive about lacking out, stated Diana Diaz, director of the ANAR Basis for at-risk kids and adolescents.
The latest explosion of AI-generated content material, and public outcry over experiences of Elon Musk’s Grok AI chatbot producing non-consensual sexual pictures, together with of minors, has fueled debate over the dangers of such on-line content material.
However there was no unanimous settlement that social media harms adolescents, stated Jose Cesar Perales, a professor in experimental psychology on the College of Granada.
Sanchez stated prosecutors would discover methods to research doable authorized infractions by Elon Musk’s Grok, in addition to by TikTok and Instagram, a part of Meta.
The proposed ban could be applied as a part of a change to an present invoice on digital safety for minors being debated in parliament, in keeping with a authorities spokesperson.
About 82% of Spaniards stated they believed kids underneath 14 needs to be banned from social media, in keeping with a 30-country Ipsos ballot on schooling printed final August. That was up from 73% in 2024.
“It’s an excellent measure to encourage kids to play with one another and never be on their cellphones in parks, which I feel is horrible, to be sincere,” stated Miguel Abad, a 19-year-old scholar in Madrid.
In Australia, social media corporations deactivated practically 5 million accounts belonging to youngsters inside weeks of the ban taking impact, the web regulator stated final month, suggesting the measure may have a sweeping influence.
Revealed – February 04, 2026 11:10 am IST