Türkiye is preparing to curb minors' access to social media, with a parliamentary report this week calling for wide-ranging measures such as age verification and content filtering, joining a growing number of countries pushing for stricter controls.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) is expected to submit a draft law on the issue soon, and Family and Social Services Minister Mahinur Özdemir Göktaş told reporters after a Cabinet meeting last month that the bill would include a social media ban for minors and compel service providers to build content-filtering systems.
The wide-ranging recommendations in this week's commission report also include the removal of content without notice and the monitoring of kids' video games or toys with AI functionality for harmful content.
Australia in December became the world's first country to ban social media for children under 16, blocking them from platforms including TikTok, Alphabet's YouTube and Meta's Instagram and Facebook.
Spain wants to prohibit social media for under-16s, while Greece and Slovenia are working on a similar ban amid mounting concerns over its impact on children's health and safety. France, Britain and Germany are also considering restrictions for minors.
The Turkish parliamentary report further recommends nighttime internet restrictions for devices used by minors under 18, mandatory content filtration on social media until aged 18 and a social media ban until aged 16.
"We need to protect our kids from moral erosion. We aim to protect our children from all types of addictions, including digital ones," Harun Mertoğlu, senior AK Party lawmaker and a member of Parliament's human rights enquiry committee, told Reuters.
Some parents echo the sentiment. Shopkeeper Belma Keçecioğlu said her 10-year-old spends hours on social media and playing games.
"It is like all the kids are social media addicts. We are already troubled by this and it gets even worse with harmful content," Keçecioğlu said, as her son played a game on his phone after school.
Social media companies have argued that bans on minors risk being undermined by weak age-verification technology and could push children onto unregulated platforms.
Current regulations in Türkiye require companies to process official or user requests within two days. Social media companies that don't conform to regulations may face advertisement bans, bandwidth reduction and fines up to 3% of global revenues.
Gaming platform Roblox, Discord and story-sharing site Wattpad have been banned in Türkiye since 2024.
