France’s social media ban for under-15s has been struck down by the country’s highest constitutional authority, in a ruling that turns on free expression guarantees enshrined in an 18th-century declaration, even as legislators in the United States move rapidly in the opposite direction.
What the France Social Media Ban Ruling Actually Struck Down
The French Constitutional Council, a nine-member body responsible for assessing whether enacted legislation complies with the constitution, ruled that a proposed ban on social media access for children under 15 would ‘disproportionately infringe upon the freedom of expression and communication.’ The council also found that the bill lacked ‘the legal safeguards necessary to ensure the right to respect for private life.’
Technically, the council struck down Article 1 of the Act to protect minors from the risks posed by the use of social media (the specific provision introducing the ban) meaning that article cannot be promulgated and will not enter into force. According to Inside Privacy, other parts of the Act may survive. The council’s decision rested on Article 11 of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen of 1789, which protects the free communication of thoughts and opinions. The council held that this right encompasses freedom to access online public communication services and to express oneself through them.
Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu had referred parts of the legislation to the council after both chambers of parliament voted through the bill in July. President Emmanuel Macron, who had long championed the measure and urged the European Union to adopt similar legislation following a 2024 stabbing attack he linked to social media exposure, now faces a substantial redraft. PBS News has reported that the social media ban was among the final major measures of Macron’s presidency before he leaves office next year.
Macron’s office has stated that the French government is determined to see the reform implemented by early 2027, a shift from his earlier target of September, at the start of the new school year. The government has indicated a replacement text will be prepared as quickly as possible, taking into account both the council’s decision and the relevant EU framework.
Texas, KOSA, and the US Push to Restrict Online Access
The France social media ban may have stalled, but the broader regulatory momentum is clearly not confined to Europe. In the United States, state-level enforcement has already produced consequences with global reach.
In June, a Travis County, Texas, court issued a writ directing Verisign, the company that maintains the ‘.com’ domain registry, to place the domain motherless.com on a registry lock after Attorney General Ken Paxton sued Kick Online Entertainment in April 2024 for violating Texas’s age-verification law. Paxton subsequently obtained a default judgment and permanent injunction against the company, which openly describes itself as a ‘moral free’ operation and had ignored the lawsuit entirely.
The court order means the site remains offline for all users worldwide unless it posts a $9.14 million bond and builds an age-verification system to Texas’s own specification. Texas’s law requires sites carrying material ‘sexually harmful to minors’ to verify user age through government-issued identification or an equivalent mechanism, not merely a click-through affirmation.
According to Domain Name Wire, the domain suspension effectively removes global access. Nico Perrino, executive vice president of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), described the situation as ‘insane.’ ‘The free internet is dead if a state court can pull a website offline worldwide simply because the registry for its domain is based in the United States,’ he wrote. Paxton has also brought separate suits against Aylo Global, Multi Media LLC, and Hammy Media (the companies behind Pornhub, Chaturbate, and xHamster) under the same state statute.
At the federal level, the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee advanced four online safety and artificial intelligence bills during a 5 August markup session. Among them was the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA), which cleared the committee by voice vote with 76 Senate cosponsors at that point. The full Senate had previously passed KOSA in 2024 by 91 votes to 3, though the House never took it up, according to K-12 Dive.
KOSA requires covered platforms to implement tools and safeguards to protect users under 17. The Senate version includes a ‘duty of care’ provision covering platforms’ design choices. FIRE has warned that design choices could be ‘broadly defined to include any feature of the platform that would cause minors to spend time on it.’ The International Association of Privacy Professionals noted that the August markup also advanced several bills addressing children’s privacy in relation to artificial intelligence.
France’s Constitutional Council has set a constitutional floor that blocked one government’s attempt to restrict minors’ online access. Whether the redrafted French legislation, shaped by that floor and the EU framework, can clear it (and whether KOSA can finally navigate the full US Congress) will determine how much of the open internet survives intact into 2027.
