Greece presents strategy to combat youth internet addiction
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The Greek government announced on Monday a national strategy to protect minors from internet addiction and excessive social media use.
Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said protecting children’s well-being was a societal imperative, although he voiced doubts regarding the effectiveness of a complete ban on social media.
Instead, he said the challenge for the future was how to design apps with children and teenagers in mind.
He was speaking in a debate with a 16-year-old as part of an event to mark the launch of the strategy whose main pillars are strengthening parental controls, age verification and engagement with social media platforms.
On Monday, Greece launched a dedicated website, providing user-friendly guides and instructions on parental control features, and next year it will roll out a digital wallet application that will serve as a parental control and age verification system.
The strategy will be applied in several steps. The first involves informing parents and children about the existing parental control capabilities on mobile phones, while the second will involve the introduction of a Kids Wallet, which will simplify the way in which parents can intervene in the control of phone use.
Addressing the event, Digital Governance Minister Dimitris Papastergiou said “bans are not the solution. The solution is dialogue, to be able to talk to children. The state must stand by parents and children.”
Immediately after the event, the first tool of the strategy, parco.gov.gr, was launched. The tool offers parents step-by-step guides on how to create time and application limits on the children’s phones on Android and Apple devices.
By spring, another tool, the Kids Wallet app, will become available. The digital wallet will also function as a parental control tool and will certify the phone user’s real age. The parent will be able to limit the use of the device from one to four hours of daily use via the platform.
Mitsotakis said that the Kids Wallet could also be implemented in other EU countries.
