Sánchez meets with digital sector companies and asks them to commit to the application of measures to protect children online

Moncloa Palace, Madrid

The Minister for the Presidency, Justice and Parliamentary Relations, Félix Bolaños; the Minister for Digital Transformation and Public Administration, José Luis Escrivá; and the Minister for Youth and Children, Sira Rego, also participated.

The meeting, which was also attended by the president of the National Commission for Markets and Competition (CNMC), Cani Fernández, and the director of the Spanish Data Protection Agency, Mar España, brought together the main players in the tech and digital sphere, with the presence of senior executives from the main companies and top representatives of the sector's associations. Specifically, Apple's Director of Government Affairs Europe, Sébastien Gros; Google's head of global privacy, safety, and security - Government Affairs and Public Policy, Katherine P. Charlet; the CEO of Masmovil, Meinrad Spenger; Meta's Deputy Head of EU Affairs, Marisa Jiménez; the President of Microsoft Spain, Alberto Granados; the CEO of Orange Spain, Ludovic Pech; the President of Telefónica, José María Álvarez-Pallete; the President and CEO of Vodafone, Mário Vaz; the Director General of Adigital, César Tello; the Director of Digital Policies, Sustainability and Talent Development of Ametic, Amalia Pelegrín, and the President of DigitalES, Federico Linares.

Comprehensive strategy, draft law and age verification tools

During the meeting with the sector, the president of the Government outlined the Executive's plans to protect children from online pornography, which include the design of a comprehensive and inter-ministerial strategy for the protection of minors online covering many areas (education, equality, digitalisation and verification), the drafting of a bill for the comprehensive protection of minors online and the development of technological tools that enable age verification.

The Council of Ministers, at the start of the year, analysed a report containing a diagnosis of the protection of minors from accessing online pornography and the serious impact it has on their emotional, affective and sexual well-being and development. The data reveal that 45% of young Spaniards consume pornography for the first time between the ages of 12 and 15, and 25% have done so before the age of 12. In addition, seven out of ten adolescents aged 13-17 years consume pornography on a regular basis, and 30% say that it is their only source of affective-sexual information.

Awareness-raising campaigns, dissemination of responsible use and monitoring tools

The President of the Government of Spain, Pedro Sánchez, during his meeting with digital sector companies to protect children online | Pool Moncloa/Borja Puig de la Bellacasa

In line with the public-private partnership model that the government has been working on, the president listened to the sector's proposals and stressed the importance of its involvement. In this regard, he called for restrictions and controls to be reinforced to prevent children from accessing online pornography, and to help combat social media addiction among children. The head of the Executive also called for additional efforts from the sector in the area of self-regulation to encourage responsible use of the digital environment.

Given the important role that the industry plays in the protection of minors in the digital sphere, the government advocates establishing cooperation mechanisms with the industry to reach commitments to adopt measures to prevent pornographic content from reaching or being accessed by minors. Therefore, industry has been urged to include effective age verification systems in their devices, applying the criteria of the Spanish Data Protection Agency (AEPD), and parental control systems, among other measures.

Non official translation