Draft Law on a Minimum Age for Social Media Platforms
Gesetzesentwurf Mindestalter Soziale Medien, Begutachtung 27 Juli 2026
A citation is an address, not a summary. The first part names the law; what follows narrows it to the exact section, article or paragraph.
Proposed: draft date not recorded.
A published draft that has not reached a legislature, dated 27 July 2026, as of 12 September 2026.
A social media and minors rule binding private bodies.
As of 6 September 2026.
Where it has got to
The text described here is Ministerialentwurf 132/ME, XXVIII. GP (Gesetzestext zur Begutachtung). That print is 132/ME XXVIII. GP, published 27 July 2026.
Locally, this stage is Begutachtungsverfahren (Ministerialentwurf 132/ME, XXVIII. GP).
The stage above is recorded at www.parlament.gv.at.
The Begutachtungsfrist (public comment period) runs to 21 September 2026. As of today no Regierungsvorlage has been submitted to the Nationalrat, so the draft has not yet been introduced as a bill.
What this law does
Drafted with AI from the cited sources under the direction of UnGovr staff. UnGovr holds editorial responsibility for this page.
Not yet in force, as proposed. A platform that uses at least one of a defined set of addictive design features, a recommendation feed weighted toward strangers' content, infinite scroll or autoplay, a continuous-use reward system, or a push notification meant to draw a user back, would have to prevent a user under 14 from opening or keeping an account, while remaining free to offer a separate child-appropriate area.
Age verification would run once at account creation, using a zero-knowledge-proof, double-blind design under which the age-attestation provider learns nothing about where or when its attestation is used, the platform receives only a true-or-false answer on whether the 14-year threshold is met, and no name, birth date, or other identifying data passes to the platform. ID Austria, the state digital-identity system, would be one available verification method among others, not a mandatory one. Very large platforms would face a fine of up to 6 percent of worldwide annual turnover for a violation.
If you get it wrong
Penalty structure
As proposed, applicable to very large platforms; the draft's fine mechanics for a platform below that threshold are not described in the source reviewed.
- Rule
- Turnover pct only
- As of
- 6 September 2026
- Currency
- EUR
- Turnover percentage cap
- 6
Who enforces it
Enforcement body
Not yet designated in the draft as reviewed.
What it reaches
Age threshold
14
Covered services
Platforms using algorithm-driven, addictive design features aimed at or reasonably likely to be used by children, such as TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, and Snapchat; messaging services such as WhatsApp are excluded.
Verification methods
Digital ID, Third party service
When LexLint raises it
operates_social_platform