§7.3 Tools for guardians

79. Tools for guardians are software, features, functionalities, or applications designed to help guardians accompany their minor’s online activity, privacy, safety and well-being, while respecting children’s agency and privacy. 80. The Commission considers that tools for guardians should be treated as complementary to safety by design and default measures and to any other measures put in place to comply with Article 28(1) of Regulation (EU) 2022/2065, including those described in these guidelines. Compliance with the obligation of providers of online platforms accessible to minors to ensure a high level of privacy, safety and security on their services must never rely exclusively on tools for guardians. Tools for guardians should not be used as the sole measure to ensure a high level of privacy, safety and security of minors on online platforms, nor be used to replace any other measures put in place for that purpose. Such measures may fail to reflect the realities of children’s lives, particularly in cases of split custody, foster care, or where guardians are absent or disengaged. Moreover, the effectiveness of parental consent is limited when the identity or legal authority of the consenting adult is not reliably verified. Providers of online platforms accessible to minors must therefore implement appropriate measures to protect minors and should not be restricted to relying on parental oversight. Nevertheless, the Commission notes that, when used in combination with other measures, tools for guardians may contribute to such a high level. 81. Therefore, the Commission considers that providers of online platforms accessible to minors should put in place guardian control tools for the purposes Article 28(1) of Regulation (EU) 2022/2065 which should: (a) Be age-appropriate and in line with the evolving capacities of minors. Tools for guardians should be grounded in communication, learning and empowerment rather than control and enable autonomy and agency of minors. They should be effective and not disproportionately restrict minors’ rights to privacy or access services, considering the best interests of the minor, as a primary consideration. (b) Be easy to use, access and activate for example by allowing the guardian to use the tool without creating an account on the service. (c) Apply regardless of the device or operating system used to access the service. (d) Provide a clear notification to minors of their activation by guardians and put other safeguards in place considering their potential misuse by guardians such as, for example, providing a clear sign to the minor in real time when any monitoring functionality is activated. (e) Ensure that changes can only be made with the same degree of authorisation required in the initial activation of the tools. (f) Be compatible with the availability of interoperable one-stop-shop tools for guardians gathering all settings and tools. 82. Tools for guardians may include features for managing default settings, setting screen time limits (see Section 6.4 on Online interface design and other tools), seeing the accounts that the minor communicates with, managing account settings, setting spending limits for the minor by default where applicable, or other features to supervise uses of the online platforms that may be detrimental to the minor’s privacy, safety and security.

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Source: EUR-Lex (Cellar) · retrieved 2026-09-07