Won’t somebody think of the European children? Meta and Google put up their hands to help on the same day

Zuck backs a ‘digital majority age’ and Google open sources tech that might enforce it

Google and Meta have independently taken actions to support a safer internet for kids – and given blockchain boosters a moment to celebrate.

Meta on Thursday proclaimed its support for a “digital majority age” – a concept that would see parental permission required before teens can use social media. France enacted a digital majority age for under-15s in 2023, and the following year President Emmanuel Macron called for all European nations to do likewise.

Meta’s post states the company supports Macron’s idea. “We believe this can be an effective solution to the industry-wide challenge of ensuring teens have safe, age-appropriate experiences online, if it is grounded in three key principles,” Meta wrote.

Those three are:

• Inclusion of a regulation that means parents approve all app downloads for children under 16;
• Consistency across all software and services, not just social media;
• “Robust age verification mechanisms” that work across the EU “at the app store or operating system level.”

As luck would have it, on Thursday Google did something that might help deliver the third of Meta’s principles by open sourcing Zero-Knowledge Proof (ZKP) libraries that can help with age verification.

The code is available on GitHub.

A post by Google Wallet product manager Alan Stapelberg explains that the code “makes it possible for people to prove that something about them is true without exchanging any other data. So, for example, a person visiting a website can verifiably prove he or she is over 18, without sharing anything else at all.”

Google announced it had added ZKP to its Wallet product in April 2025, when Stapelberg explained “many sites and services require age verification” and Google wanted its wallet to do that job without linking users’ age to their identity.

The Chocolate Factory built its ZKP tech on a protocol developed by an outfit named Ligero, that created its wares in part to improve on ZKP used to scale blockchains.

Stapelberg’s Thursday post notes that the EU has encouraged member states to use ZKP in the forthcoming European Digital Identity Wallet – a planned tool the bloc’s residents can use to store documents like ID cards and driving licenses.

European nations might also decide to use Google’s code to implement Zuck’s vision of age assurance.

Of course this is not all sweetness and light as Europe is unhappy that Meta and Google allow kids to see all sorts of nasty material, and passed laws that could see them fined colossal sums for doing so. Both companies are therefore fighting for their futures when they fight to protect kids. ®