France plans to ban children under 15 from social media sites and to ban cellphones in high schools from September 2026, local media reported Wednesday, moves that underscore growing public anxiety over the impact of online harm on minors.
President Emmanuel Macron has often pointed to social media as one of the causes of violence among young people and has signaled that he wants France to follow Australia, whose world’s first ban on under-16s on social media platforms including Facebook, Snapchat, TikTok and YouTube came into force in December.
His government will submit draft laws for legal scrutiny in early January, Le Monde and France Info reported.
Macron did not mention the proposed legislation in a New Year’s Eve speech, but he promised to “protect our children and teenagers from social media and screens.”
Earlier, the Elysee and the prime minister’s office declined to comment on media reports.
Mobile phones have been banned in French primary and secondary schools since 2018, and the reported new changes would extend the ban to high schools. Students aged 11 to 15 attend middle schools in the French education system.
France also passed a law in 2023 requiring social platforms to obtain parental consent for under-15s to create accounts, although technical challenges have hindered its enforcement.
Macron wants more action at EU level
Macron said in June he would push for EU-level regulation to ban access to social media for anyone under 15 after a fatal stabbing at a school in eastern France shocked the nation.
The European Parliament called in November for the EU to set a minimum age for children to access social media to combat a rise in mental health problems among young people from excessive exposure, although it is member states that set age limits.
Various other countries have also taken steps to regulate children’s access to social media.
Macron enters the new year with his domestic legacy in tatters after his bid for the 2024 general election led to a hung parliament, sparking France’s worst political crisis in decades that has seen a series of weak governments.
But according to opinion polls, cracking down further on minors’ access to social media may become popular. A Harris Interactive poll in 2024 found that 73% of those polled supported a ban on social media access for under-15s.
