{"id":66304,"date":"2026-09-09T11:59:59","date_gmt":"2026-09-09T09:59:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mentalhealtheurope.org\/?p=66304"},"modified":"2026-09-09T11:59:59","modified_gmt":"2026-09-09T09:59:59","slug":"joint-statement-making-online-safety-a-reality-for-children","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mentalhealtheurope.org\/joint-statement-making-online-safety-a-reality-for-children\/","title":{"rendered":"Joint Statement: Making Online Safety a Reality for Children"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>9 September 2026 &#8211; Brussels, Belgium<\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\"><strong>Following the publication of the European Commission\u2019s expert panel report on child safety online, Mental Health Europe has joined more than 50 organisations and experts in calling on the EU to turn its recommendations into meaningful action. The report takes an important step forward by recognising the risks digital services can pose to children\u2019s wellbeing and placing greater responsibility on providers to ensure their services are safe and age-appropriate.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">The joint statement calls for EU-wide standards for safe and age-appropriate digital products, stronger oversight and enforcement, and measures that address harmful design features at their source. Crucially, responsibility for online safety should not fall primarily on children and parents, but on the companies designing and providing these services.<\/p>\n<p>Mental Health Europe signed the statement because protecting young people\u2019s mental health requires us to address the digital environments shaping their lives. We support a European approach that moves beyond age restrictions alone and ensures digital products protect and empower children <strong>by design and by default<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<a class=\"button button--arrow button--orange button--md mt-50\" href=\"https:\/\/www.mentalhealtheurope.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Joint-Statement-on-the-expert-panel-report_5R_September-2026.pdf\" target=\"_blank\"><span class=\"button__text\">Read Statement<\/span><\/a>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>9 September 2026 &#8211; Brussels, Belgium Following the publication of the European Commission\u2019s expert panel report on child safety online, Mental Health Europe has joined more than 50 organisations and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21,"featured_media":66313,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[89,104],"tags":[355,396,408,418,419,420],"class_list":["post-66304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-press-releases","tag-children","tag-social-media","tag-addictive-design","tag-tech-regulation","tag-digital-services-act","tag-children-well-being"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.7 - 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