April 29 (UPI) -- The European Commission said Wednesday that a preliminary investigation had found U.S. tech giant Meta was violating European Union digital law by not doing enough to keep children younger than 13 off Instagram and Facebook.
The assessment found Instagram and Facebook in breach of the bloc's Digital Services Act because they were "failing to diligently identify, assess and mitigate the risks of minors under 13 years old accessing their services," the commission said in a news release.
The commission said there was significant evidence from EU member countries that about 10-12% of children under 13 were using Instagram and Facebook as a result, a larger proportion than Meta's estimates.
It also accused Meta of ignoring "readily available scientific evidence" that has found younger children were especially vulnerable to being harmed by being on social media platforms.
The commission noted that guardrails implemented by Meta were insufficient to enforce its own terms and conditions, which state that minors must be 13 to access the platforms, or to identify and block them once they have begun using them.
