Spain's social media ban for under-16s falls as Sánchez calls an election

Spain's plan to keep children under 16 off social media has fallen with the dissolution of parliament. On Monday the prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, called a general election for 29 November, and under the rules governing the Cortes every bill still in passage lapses automatically once the chambers are dissolved. A new government that wants the measure back on the statute book would have to steer it through again from the beginning. Sánchez announced the early election on 5 October after Congress rejected the government's housing decree-laws, and a royal decree published the next day made the dissolution of the Cortes Generales official.

Few bills carried more weight for families in the government's programme. The draft law protecting minors in digital environments was the furthest advanced of three flagship social measures, sitting at the amendment stage in the Congress of Deputies, and its central promise was what ministers had called a "digital age of majority" at 16: a rise in the minimum age for opening a social media account from 14 to 16. Its collapse leaves the timetable for that change, and for a set of new duties on the platforms themselves, uncertain.

The bill and what it required

When parliament was dissolved, the bill stood in ponencia, the closed-door stage at which parliamentary groups study the amendments tabled against a text. The government had planned to write the under-16 prohibition into the law by amendment, applying it to all networks except those that produce no harmful effects. A separate route for younger teenagers to open accounts with the express authorisation of a parent or guardian was under discussion.

The obligations fell mainly on the industry. Platforms would have been required to build age-verification systems that were genuinely effective, replacing the simple date-of-birth forms that any user can complete with false details. Executives would have faced personal legal responsibility for failing to remove content that breaks the law or promotes hatred, and the bill would have created a criminal offence of manipulating algorithms to amplify illegal content artificially. Manufacturers of devices with internet access would have had to include free protective tools, such as parental controls, as standard. The draft also meant new Criminal Code offences covering deepfakes, the manipulation of images or voices so that they appear real.

Where the plan began

Sánchez unveiled the proposal in February at the World Government Summit in Dubai, where he described social networks as "a failed state, a place where laws are ignored, where crimes are tolerated and where disinformation is worth more than the truth". The announcement formed part of a package of five measures aimed at changing how digital platforms are used in Spain, and aligned the country with five other European governments in the Coalition of the Digital Willing, a group seeking stricter, coordinated rules on social media use across Europe.

In August, the youth and children's minister, Sira Rego, said the text was continuing through parliament while its final contributions were added, and framed it as one of the government's principal measures for strengthening the protection of children and adolescents online.

Scrutiny of TikTok and Instagram

The government, working with the public prosecutor's office, said it would examine the legal compliance of named services, pointing to TikTok and Instagram as the platforms with the greatest presence among young people in Spain. The scale of that test is considerable: TikTok counts 21 million users in Spain, with more than 40% of its base aged between 12 and 24, the very age range the law was designed to protect.

A Europe moving at different speeds

Spain would not have been the first country to act. Australia has had legislation in force since December setting 16 as the minimum age for social media access, the usual point of comparison in international debate. France is working through a proposal for a limit of 15, alongside restrictions on mobile phones in schools, although that has not yet become an applicable law. The European Parliament has recommended a general threshold of 16, a signal of its concern about the impact of networks on children's mental health and development.

At Commission level, the picture is still forming. In September the European executive presented its own draft: under-15s would not be able to open accounts on social networks or video platforms without a parent's authorisation. The Commission must still negotiate the text with member states and the Parliament before it can become law.

Doubts over enforcement

The scientific case cited for measures of this kind rests on studies documenting disturbed sleep, reduced physical activity and mood changes associated with heavy social media use among adolescents. Critical voices have questioned, however, whether age verification can really be made effective without compromising users' privacy, and whether a legal prohibition can hold back access to platforms that are already woven into young people's daily lives.

Two other government bills fell with the dissolution: the organic law on the good use and governance of artificial intelligence, sent to Congress in June, and the law against vicarious machist violence, which passed its first congressional test on 30 September after an amendment from Vox.

Background: claims in the US courts

The background below draws on published analyses and reports: the European Commission's Digital Services Act package, the Law Gazette, Clyde & Co, Insurance Journal, Seeger Weiss and Click2Houston.

The Digital Services Act, an EU law setting rules for online services such as social networks, marketplaces and app stores, aims to protect people's rights online across the Union. Separately, social media court cases in the United States, brought by individual users and by school districts, continue to move. On 25 March 2026 a jury verdict in Los Angeles found Meta, the owner of Instagram, and Google, the owner of YouTube, liable in the case of a young woman referred to as K.G.M. Three further personal injury trials against YouTube, Snap and Meta were set for October 2026; a second trial due in July instead ended when TikTok, Snapchat and YouTube settled with the plaintiff. The first school-district test case against Meta, Snap, TikTok and YouTube, brought by a county school district in Kentucky, also settled before a trial scheduled for June 2026, with no figure disclosed. The next school-district trials, for Tucson Unified and Charleston County, are due to begin in 2027. On 10 September 2026 a judge in Texas found TikTok liable for deceiving parents about how safe the app is, with a separate trial on penalties due the following month. In the UK, one lawyer has argued that social media firms could be seen as makers of a digital space under the Consumer Protection Act 1987, which has usually been applied to physical items; the Law Commission is examining whether that Act fits the digital age.

What happens next

The Cortes are dissolved and Spain goes to the polls on 29 November. If the minors' digital protection law is to return, its chances depend on the composition of the new chambers and on the priorities of whatever government emerges. Reports indicate that the new Cortes are due to constitute on 23 December and that the minors and artificial intelligence bills would not return to Congress before spring 2027.