Report from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions on the application of the Council Recommendation of 24 September 1998 concerning the protection of minors and human dignity and of the Recommendation of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 December 2006 on the protection of minors and human dignity and on the right of reply in relation to the competitiveness of the European audiovisual and online inform

The objective of the 1998 and the 2006 Recommendations on Protection of Minors was to make Member States and industry conscious of the new challenges for the protection of minors in electronic media, particularly those linked to the uptake and growing importance of online services. Considering that regulation cannot always keep pace with these developments, they were called upon to promote and develop appropriate framework conditions by other than purely legal means, e.g. through stakeholder cooperation and co- or self regulation.

In the meantime, changes in consumers' and particularly minors' use of media have been dramatic and are constantly accelerating. Media are increasingly being used by minors via mobile devices, including (online) video games, and there are more and more on-demand media services on the Internet. As a new phenomenon since the last Recommendation, social networking sites have gained huge importance, both for individual users and in societal terms. More changes that we might not even think of yet are likely to come.

These new developments offer many opportunities for minors, but bring some challenges regarding their protection, considering that parents often have difficulties in carrying out their responsibilities in relation to new technology products and services that are usually less known to them than to their children. We must therefore ask the question whether current policies are still suitable and adequate to ensure a high level of protection for minors throughout Europe.

In order to better assess what has already been done and what further steps might be necessary, the present report – responding to the call in Point 6 of the 2006 Recommendation – analyses the implementation and effectiveness of the measures specified in the 1998 and 2006 Recommendations in the Member States.

The report has been prepared on the basis of information supplied by the Member States in response to a questionnaire. It complements several actions in the Digital Agenda for Europe. More detailed information on the responses and on specific examples of measures taken is available in the accompanying Staff Working Paper [see Related Url].

• Primary Source

EUR-Lex: COM(2011)556: Follow the progress of this document through the decision-making procedure http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/HIS/?uri=COM:2011:556:FIN

European Commission: SEC(2011)1043: Commission staff working paper http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=SEC:2011:1043:FIN:EN:PDF

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