Social media literacy or all-out bans? How children can be better protected against cyberviolence

While Europe debates how to keep children off social media, EIGE's research is asking, what happens when they get there?

In countless classrooms across Europe, teachers caution students about being careful what they share online.

Yet too many girls listening know that this advice is too little, too late.

That's because something has already happened to them or to one of their friends… and that's usually the reason the lesson in online safety is happening at all.

As part of our work on gender-based cyber violence, girls across ten Member States told EIGE researchers similar versions of this story.

Schools tend to talk about online safety after an incident, and rarely before it. As a result, the message feels dated and disconnected from the platforms the students actually use. And when young people do report what is happening to them online, adults often minimise it, dismiss it, or break their confidence.

"We cannot wait until something goes wrong to start talking to children about life online. Digital literacy must be part of their education from the start, giving them the tools to navigate the online world safely and confidently," says EIGE Director Carlien Scheele.

Giulia Grandin, policy analyst and equality officer at Brussels-based think tank the Lisbon Council conducts research and policy analysis on children's online safety.

And, from her experience, young people's voices are the most important in the room.

"Centering children is the most important thing we can do. Literally listening to them, hearing from them, and asking how it affects them," says Giulia.

Why the old advice stopped working

For years, prevention came down to one simple instruction: don't share intimate images of yourself. Technology has overtaken that advice.

Researchers monitored X's Grok tool over a 24-hour period in early January 2026. They found that it generated around 6,700 sexually suggestive or nudifying images per hour. By comparison, the next five largest sites producing this type of content generated just 79 images per hour combined -meaning Grok's output was around 85 times higher.

The European Commission has since opened a formal investigation.

What makes AI-generated abuse different is that no real photograph is needed. A school portrait will do, or a family snap lifted from a parent's social media.

Violation has since changed shape. It is no longer consent to share an image. It is consent to exist as one at all.

The gap between what adults see and what girls live

Adolescents in Europe now spend an average of four and a half hours a day online during the school week, rising to over six at weekends, according to Eurobarometer.

Most of that time is invisible to the adults around them.

EIGE researchers explored these hidden online experiences through focus groups with girls aged 13 to 18 and boys aged 15 to 18 across ten Member States.

Our study found that prevention and education systems across Europe do not reflect the digital realities young people are living in.

Why a blanket ban falls short

Much of the current political energy is going into limiting access through age verification, minimum ages and national bans modelled on Australia's.

Two thirds of Europeans now want EU rules limiting children's access by age. In response, and to anchor the debate on concrete data, the Lisbon Council built its Evidence Hub.

Collected figures reveal important findings, such as:

• More than half of Europe's 15-year-olds (51%)can easily manage digital privacy settings, and this ability is closely linked to socio-economic status;
• Platforms telling children they will investigate a report doubled (13% to 27%). Yet, actual removal of content has fallen from 41% to 27%
• Almost half (45%) of children aged nine to 16 say social media restrictions would limit their freedoms and rights.

Other evidence on whether blanket bans work is discouraging. Three months after Australia's ban for under-16s, the country's eSafety Commissioner found that around 70% had managed to keep their accounts on Instagram, Snapchat and TikTok.

Giulia has spent the past year convening Member State officials, Australian experts, children's rights advocates and youth representatives to chart an effective path ahead.

"There is no silver bullet to protect minors online," she says. "It takes a set of measures and actions that several stakeholders can collaborate to bring to life."

In this context, Giulia singles out the Digital Services Act (DSA) as a "vital investigative tool" to make it happen, boosting child safety online.

"The Commission announced another legislative tool, the Digital Fairness Act, complementing its DSA arm that would focus on commercial practices (such as dark patterns, marketing by influencers or design rather than content)," she explains.

"Social media is not a monolith. A private group chat for school is useful for communication and connection; an infinite scroll feed tuned for dopamine is a risk.

"The most powerful safeguard is requiring that the moment a platform identifies a minor, its entire system must flip to work in that child's best interest.

"Safety should be the default setting…remember that an online space that is safe for children is safer for all users, of all ages and genders."

President von der Leyen's special panel on child safety recommends staged access by age, supervision for the youngest and safe defaults for adolescents.

The DSA was built to enforce the burden of proving a service is safe onto the shoulders of the platform offering that service.

Regulation that ensures safety by design can influence the platforms, but it cannot reach into the classroom.

What young people are asking for

"My work with youth representatives reveals that minors are not asking to be banned," says Giulia.

"They are asking for control, inclusion and participation."

She lists specific recommendations from young people, including:

• Hands-on digital literacy;
• Platforms that are safe by design;
• And investment in offline spaces.

"They additionally highlight the importance of online spaces for marginalised youth, including LGBTQI+ youth or those in isolated areas," Giulia says.

"True digital safety is not measured by how the average user navigates a platform, but by the impact the environment has on the most vulnerable people."

Education in online safety is still aimed mostly at secondary schools, while first exposure happens years earlier.

There is a strong argument that it should begin with the first device rather than the first crisis. What it teaches has to change, too. That means:

• Consent taught as something contextual, ongoing and revocable;
• How to recognise manipulated content;
• What to do in the first hour after a counterfeit image starts circulating;
• And education aimed squarely at boys, as they go on to make up the majority of abusers.

But, none of this will work if it is done to young people rather than with them.

"We often talk about young people, without them. There should be nothing about them, without them," says Giulia.

"Children should be included, not as a box-ticking exercise, but from the ideation phase to implementation."

EIGE believes that ending gender-based cyber violence takes more than enforcement.

"Ending gender-based cyber violence means changing the environments in which young people grow up, both online and offline. That means safer platforms, better education and bringing boys and young men into the solution," adds Carlien.

We recommend embedding mandatory, gender-responsive digital literacy across primary and secondary education, covering digital identity, online relationships, misinformation, AI-generated content and online safety.

• Co-design those programmes with young people;
• Build in bystander intervention;
• Bring boys and young men into the work of challenging the norms that make this behaviour pay.

Together, we can lay the groundwork for this before children get their first phone, rather than after the harm arrives.