Brussels (EuroEFE).- The European Commission urged PornHub, Stripchat, XNXX and XVideos platforms this Thursday to implement effective age verification systems to protect minors, after preliminarily concluding that these websites violate the Digital Services Act (DSA) by allowing children access to pornographic content.

«Minors are accessing adult content at increasingly younger ages and these platforms must implement robust measures, which respect privacy and are effective, to keep minors out of their services», declared in a statement the Executive Vice-President of the European Commission responsible for Technological Sovereignty, Security and Democracy, Henna Virkkunen.

The European Commission initiated its investigation against PornHub, Stripchat, XNXX and XVideos in May 2025 and, almost a year later, in its preliminary conclusions considers that the four websites have not adequately assessed the risks that their services pose to minors nor have they adopted effective measures to mitigate them, which constitutes a possible infringement of European regulations. Brussels believes that the platforms did not use sufficiently rigorous methodologies to analyze those risks and gave excessive weight to business issues, such as reputational impact, instead of focusing on the social effects on minors, as required by the EU Digital Services Act.

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The "self-declaration" of age is not effective

The Commission also points to clear deficiencies in protection measures, as these websites allow access through a simple declaration by the user that they are over 18 years old. Consider that this "self-declaration" system is not effective and points out that other safeguards applied, such as blurring pages, warnings about content or "adults only" tags, do not really prevent minors from accessing harmful material. Therefore, the Community Executive emphasizes that these platforms must implement effective age verification mechanisms and, at the same time, respectful of users' privacy. The investigated companies can now respond and take action. If they fail to comply with the requirements of the European Commission, they may be fined up to 6% of the global annual turnover of each company.

Investigation into Snapchat

At the same time, the European Commission opened an investigation against Snapchat to assess whether that American social network complies with European child protection regulations, suspecting that they may be exposed to attempts at sexual grooming, criminal activities, and age-restricted products. «From 'grooming' (pedophile cyber deception) and exposure to illegal products to account settings that undermine the safety of minors, Snapchat seems to have overlooked that the Digital Services Act (DSA) demands high safety standards for all users,» stated the Vice-President of the European Commission for Technological Sovereignty, Henna Virkkunen, in a statement. In its preliminary analysis, the European Commission indicates that minors on Snapchat could be exposed to sexual grooming attempts, recruitment for criminal activities, and content related to the sale of illegal or age-restricted products, such as drugs, e-cigarettes, or alcohol. Among the main concerns is age verification, as Snapchat relies on insufficient self-declaration systems which, according to the European Commission, may not prevent access by children under 13 or allow the experience to be adapted to users under 17.

Content Moderation System

The Commission also questions the default configuration of the accounts, considering that it does not offer an adequate level of privacy and security.

For example, accounts of minors may be automatically recommended to other users through tools like 'Find Friends' ('Find friends'), while notifications are enabled by default.

Another focus of the investigation is the possible insufficiency of the content moderation systems, which would not be preventing the dissemination of information that facilitates the purchase of illegal or restricted products, nor preventing minors from accessing that type of content, according to the Commission's first analysis.

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Furthermore, Brussels suspects that the mechanisms for reporting illegal content are not easily accessible or intuitive, and could even incorporate deceptive design elements known as "dark patterns." The opening of this procedure allows the Commission to gather more evidence, including requests for information, interviews or inspections, and eventually adopt precautionary measures or sanctions. It can also accept company commitments to correct the deficiencies detected.