French President Emmanuel Macron has announced that he will push for European Union (EU) regulation banning social networking sites for children under 15 following the tragic attack on a school in eastern France in which a teacher’s assistant was killed, reports Politico.
Greece, supported by France and Spain, is spearheading efforts to get the EU to significantly limit the amount of time teenagers can spend on the internet.
Macron, speaking to the French public, hopes to see results in the coming months.
“We must ban social media for those under 15. I am giving us a few months to start mobilising in Europe. Otherwise, we will start doing it in France. We cannot wait,” said Macron, speaking on French TV channel France 2 after the high school knifing.
Police on Tuesday questioned a 14-year-old student in connection with the knifing of a 31-year-old teacher’s assistant during a search of bags for weapons.
Prime Minister Francois Bayrou told Parliament that the incident was not an isolated incident. Macron said that social media is one of the factors that contribute to violence among young people.
Although most social media do not allow children under the age of 13 to use their platforms, it is easy for children to circumvent such restrictions.
Macron also announced that France will soon introduce age verification for sites selling knives on the internet, similar to what is currently in place for pornographic sites.
“A 15-year-old will no longer be able to buy a knife on the internet. We will introduce massive financial sanctions and bans,” he promised. Earlier, Prime Minister said he wanted to move quickly to ban the sale of “all knives” to minors.
Later in the evening, Macron wrote on the X website: “Platforms have the possibility to check age. Let’s do it!”
French authorities have already launched a drive to force certain social networking sites, including X, Reddit, Bluesky and Mastodon, to introduce age verification, classifying them as pornographic sites.
On the 7th of June, French measures requiring porn sites to verify the age of their users came into force, leading to the closure of the world’s largest porn site, Pornhub, in France. Demand for virtual private network (VPN) services, which allow users to trick websites into believing they are in another location, increased immediately.