Introduction
As the digital world develops, legislators have to act quickly to keep up, and some rules become outdated. Children and teens face increasingly negative effects from online platforms. Digital designs such as personalised recommendations and dark patterns, including autoplay, infinite scrolling, and misleading influencer marketing, have raised concerns about changing consumer protection (European Parliament, n.d.). The EU has a rounded legal framework, including the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive (UCPD), the Digital Services Act (DSA) and the Audio-Visual Media Services Directive (AVMSD), but questions remain about their effectiveness against emerging practices (European Parliament, n.d.). In 2024, the EU conducted a Digital Fairness Fitness Check, which identified limitations of the existing legal instruments (European Commission, 2024). Following this disclosure, the EU began drafting the Digital Fairness Act (DFA), which may include changes to how minors may be affected by social media (European Parliament, n.d.). This paper will analyse how the DFA can connect the regulatory gaps to ensure the safety and protection of young people without undermining businesses.
Minors as Vulnerable Consumers
Children are especially vulnerable to online environments, specifically social media. They are one of the first to deal with the developments of technology and are very active online (European Commission, Joint Research Centre, 2025). Their brains are undergoing rapid changes in development, which makes it difficult to recognise persuasive commercial practices (European Commission, Joint Research Centre, 2025). Platforms use features such as profiling-based recommendations, which may target a minor’s behavioural weaknesses and trap them in prolonged loops of engagement. Algorithmic systems use research on behavioural patterns to influence the choices children make on their platforms (European Digital Policy Initiative, n.d.). The digital ecosystem is not made with the vulnerabilities of children in mind, making the element of age legally relevant when regulating platforms.
Existing EU Protections and Their Limitations for Minors Online
The European Union currently has in place multiple consumer protection regulations. However, much of the existing legislation may not accurately account for all the risks minors are facing. Firstly, the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive (UCPD) sets commercial protections in business-to-consumer relations. Article 5(3) of the UCPD states that if a commercial practice is likely to exploit the economic decisions or behaviours of a vulnerable group, such as an age group, that practice should be assessed from the perspective of the average member of that group. (Directive 2005/29/EC, 2005, Art. 5(3)). The article recognises the age-specific vulnerability when legally assessing unfair commercial practices, however, the mere fact that the UCPD acknowledges the vulnerable group does not imply that every practice that may exploit vulnerabilities is prohibited. Additionally, the UCPD handles specific commercial bans, such as false or deceptive claims about a product, service, or advertisements that hide essential information under Articles 6 and 7. Nonetheless, it was not originally drafted to target algorithmic behavioural nudging or unfair practices that alter a child’s economic decisions. (Directive 2005/29/EC, 2005, Art. 6-7).
Moreover, the UCPD Annex I currently has a list of specific commercial practices that are prohibited yet only point 28 directly refers to children-related safeguards (Directive 2005/29/EC, 2005, Annex I, point 28). It regulates advertising that manipulates children or caregivers to purchase the product being advertised (Directive 2005/29/EC, 2005, Annex I, point 28). While this provision would explicitly prohibit an advertisement that encourages a child to buy a product, other less obvious dark patterns would become harder to prohibit under point 28. The directive tackles some of the existing problems consumers are facing, but there are still features that articles 5(3), 6, 7 and point 28 of Annex I may not cover.
A similar issue can also be seen in the DSA. The DSA addresses digital practices that affect European consumers in their daily digital lives, such as the conduct of illegal hate speech, disinformation, systemic risks, and online advertising, by imposing specific obligations on online platforms (Regulation (EU) 2022/2065, 2022). The DSA article 28 outlines the appropriate measures that should be taken to protect children’s privacy and safety, including prohibiting targeted advertisements based on a minor’s online profile (Regulation (EU) 2022/2065, 2022, Art. 28). The fundamental rights of the child, set out in Article 24 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (Charter), are protected under Article 34(1)(b) of the DSA, which requires large platforms to perform risk assessments on their designs or the functioning of their services (Regulation (EU) 2022/2065, 2022, Art. 34). This obligation applies to Very Large Online Platforms (VLOPs) and Search Engines (VLOSEs), defined under Article 33 as those having 45 million or more active monthly users (Regulation (EU) 2022/2065, 2022, Art. 33). Article 34(1)(d) links the protection of children, as mandated by the Charter, to any negative effects which may be caused or be foreseeably caused, affecting their physical and mental well-being. However, Article 34 only covered large platforms and search engines, meaning that smaller online environments have other digital obligations but are not subject to mandatory risk systems that specifically protect the rights of the child.
The EU also utilises sector-specific regulatory instruments for specific content services. Namely, platforms that display videos, broadcast, or allow video-sharing, such as TikTok and YouTube, are covered by the Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVMSD). The AVMSD prevents the spread of harmful content, which children may or may not be exposed to (Directive 2010/13/EU, 2010). Article 28b(3) states multiple safeguards platforms can impose to protect minors on their platforms, including age verification, parent control systems, and flagging content which may be reported as harming one’s physical, moral, or mental well-being (Directive 2010/13/EU, 2010, Art. 28b(3)). Such measures regulate the access that minors have to harmful information.
There are other frameworks covering child online safety from the perspectives of data protection (the GDPR) and AI system regulation (the AI Act), which contribute to protecting minors from harmful practices but are not strictly adjacent to consumer law, and whose interplay with the DFA is a separate discipline outside of the scope of this article.
Where the DFA Can Fill in the Gaps
Following the 2024 Digital Fairness Fitness Check, conducted to ensure that current rules are properly achieving a high level of consumer protection, the European Commission began preparing the Digital Fairness Act to strengthen digital fairness for consumers online without creating unnecessary burdens on innovation for businesses across the EU (European Commission, 2024). The Fitness Check concluded that the existing frameworks are vital to continue providing consumer protection in the Digital Single Market, however, as the digital world rapidly evolves, so do harmful designs affecting consumers, which were not delineated in the former legislation (European Commission, 2024, p. 154). The unfair practices found are related to misleading prices, influencer marketing, addictive designs, and unfair contract terms (European Commission, 2024, p. 154). The Fitness Check revealed a study from 2022 which found that 97% of the most used platforms contained at least one dark pattern (European Commission, 2024, p. 152). Consumers are being exposed to harmful practices on platforms that they interact with daily, showing that there is an imperativeness to adopt the DFA (European Commission, 2024, p. 152).
To substantiate this, the European Commission conducted a survey in April of 2026 to gain insight into what EU children and adolescents deem important when it comes to digital fairness. It showed that 78% of children agree to an age restriction feature on platforms and 48% agree to restrictions on digital designs that encourage screen time, such as infinite scroll (European Commission, 2026). These statistics demonstrate that young people are encountering these dark patterns themselves on online platforms and support the enforcement of the legislation to stop them.
In fact, the Commission has already started enforcing the DSA on this matter: for instance, after starting an investigation into TikTok under the DSA, it found that the company may have violated its risk assessment and risk mitigation obligations (European Commission, 2026). The platform uses addictive features such as infinite scroll, autoplay, and push notifications, while management tools such as parent controls and screen time restrictions may not be up to the standard to minimise them (European Commission, 2026). Therefore, the preliminary findings suggest that the platform was failing to take proportionate and effective measures to protect the well-being of consumers.
In this context, the EU must find the balance between enforcing the existing legislation, such as the DSA, and filling in the remaining gaps through the DFA. The EU can bridge this enforcement gap by implementing a few provisions:
- The DFA can be designed to expand onto the UCPD and include unfair personalised manipulation. By textually defining deceptive interface optimisation, such as hidden costs or forced continuous scrolling, autoplay, and gamified loops, as a misleading omission. This eliminates deceptive user interfaces without confusing businesses and ensures consumer protection.
- Unfair commercial advertising by influencers should be regulated by the DFA. The survey conducted by the EU on children’s input showed that 69% of children believe that influencers should only promote products or services that are deemed appropriate and safe for minors (European Commission, 2026). Introducing clear rules for influencer marketing will create transparency in product promotion, and such disclosures may reduce misleading marketing. This could terminate the marketing strategies that are influencing children’s economic decisions online.
- The DFA should aim to regulate addictive gaming designs. While point 28 of the UCPD regulates exhortations directed at children, it struggles to control features designed to retain the users’ attention or distort the true value of a product. Features such as loot boxes and pay-to-win mechanisms prompt users to spend more for an item than they originally intended, mimicking a gambling-like system for minors (European Parliament, n.d.). Additionally, 80% of children agree to placing restrictions on loot boxes on platforms (European Commission, 2026). Regulating this addictive design is a popular opinion amongst young people, which the EU should be taking into consideration.
Conclusion
The vulnerabilities consumers face online are already codified in the existing framework. While these measures remain necessary, additional oversight is still required to uphold the high level of protection EU consumers are entitled to. The proposed DFA embodies a crucial evolution to European policy. By clarifying the UCPD to specifically mention deceptive designs, regulating illusory influencer marketing, and prohibiting designs that imitate gaming features to mislead consumers on prices, the DFA can close the gaps in its system.
References
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