The European Commission has formally adopted its proposal for the EU KIDS Act, putting greater control over recommendation systems, safer feeds, and protections against addictive design at the heart of its plans for children online.
For Cybersmile, this is a major campaign victory. The issues we documented, researched, and took directly to the European Commission are now reflected in a formal legislative proposal.
Earlier this year, we published original evidence showing how quickly recommendation systems can expose people to harmful content and how little control many users feel they have over the algorithms shaping their feeds. We submitted that evidence directly to the European Commission, met with senior Commission officials, and later sat down with its enforcement team to discuss algorithmic harm, recommendation systems, and the importance of user agency. Now, those exact issues sit at the center of European lawmaking.
Stop the Forced Feed began with a simple belief that people should have meaningful control over the algorithms shaping what they see online. We built the evidence, developed the framework, and took that case directly to the European Commission. To now see those same principles reflected in a formal European legislative proposal is a major victory for the campaign. This is exactly the kind of systemic change we set out to drive, and it shows what can happen when evidence, advocacy, and direct policy engagement come together.
Scott Freeman, CEO, The Cybersmile Foundation
Under the KIDS Act, recommender systems used by minors would have to be designed around safety rather than engagement. Children would be given greater ability to choose, tune, and control recommended content, while platforms would be required to reduce the risk of harmful recommendation pathways and so-called "rabbit holes." Personalization based on tracking would be switched off by default, and what a young person actively chooses to follow would take priority over behavioral signals designed to predict what will keep them engaged.
The proposal also targets addictive design features, including endless autoplay, infinite scrolling, and notifications designed to pull children back into a service. More broadly, the Commission is proposing to reverse the burden of proof, requiring providers to demonstrate that services used by children are age-appropriate and safe by design.
These are not peripheral changes to the online safety debate. They go directly to the architecture of the feed itself.
From evidence to European policy
When we began developing Stop the Forced Feed in June 2025, we argued that online safety could not be addressed solely by removing harmful content after somebody had already seen it. The systems deciding what gets promoted, amplified, and repeatedly placed in front of people had to become part of the conversation too. Our Forced Feed 2026 research gave us the evidence to make that case.
The behavioral component of our study found that harmful content could be served to adult test accounts in as little as 16 seconds and to accounts representing children in as little as eight minutes. Within three days, 90% of accounts had encountered racist content, while 60% had been exposed to misogyny and 60% to violence.
Our nationally representative research also showed a clear gap between the power of recommendation systems and the control people felt they had over them. Only 36% said they felt in control of their algorithm and the content they saw, while 65% wanted more control and 69% wanted greater insight into why algorithms were deciding to show them particular content.
That evidence became the basis of Stop the Forced Feed and our PROTECT framework, which called for a transfer of power from platforms to users and for meaningful control over algorithms to be treated as a basic user right. We called this principle 'content with consent.'
The argument was straightforward, that people should not have to surrender control over what they consume simply because they use social media. Recommendation systems should respond to people, rather than people being required to accept whatever recommendation systems decide to put in front of them.
We took the case directly to the European Commission
In February we published our original research and submitted the findings as evidence directly to the European Commission, highlighting algorithmic harm and the need for greater transparency, accountability, and user agency within recommendation systems.
In March, we met Werner Stengg at the European Commission to discuss the research and its wider implications for recommendation systems.
In May, we met Prabhat Agarwal and members of the Commission's enforcement team for further discussions specifically focused on algorithmic harm, recommendation systems, and user agency.
Those engagements formed part of a much wider program of policy work around Stop the Forced Feed, including evidence submitted to Ofcom, the UK Government, and the Council of Europe's Commissioner for Human Rights, as well as engagement with Members of Parliament and raising the issue directly with the Prime Minister.
The KIDS Act proposal contains concrete measures addressing precisely the areas Cybersmile had placed before the Commission such as the power of recommender systems, the risks created by engagement-driven design, the need to reduce harmful algorithmic pathways, and the importance of giving users more meaningful control over what reaches them.
That makes the KIDS Act the clearest policy victory yet for Stop the Forced Feed. The campaign put these issues directly before the European Commission; months later, user agency, safer recommender systems, protection from engagement-driven feeds, and stronger platform responsibility now sit inside a formal EU legislative proposal.
The feed itself is becoming an online safety issue
The significance of the KIDS Act is not simply that Europe wants stronger protections for children. The proposal reflects a deeper change in how online harm is being understood.
For years, much of the online safety debate concentrated on the content itself and whether a particular post, image, or video was harmful, illegal, or inappropriate. Stop the Forced Feed argued that this was only part of the picture.
What matters is also why that content reaches someone, why it keeps appearing, what signals caused a system to recommend it, and how much power the individual has to stop it from happening again. That distinction is now becoming embedded in policy.
The Commission says that recommender algorithms for minors should be safe for children, give them more ability to choose and control recommended content, and reduce the likelihood of being dragged into harmful rabbit holes. Its explanation of the KIDS Act also makes clear that feeds should prioritize what children actively choose rather than relying on tracking and engagement signals to determine what keeps them watching. This goes to the heart of what Stop the Forced Feed was created to address.
A campaign victory
For us, the significance of this moment is not just that European policy has moved in the same direction as Stop the Forced Feed. It is that there is a clear record of the campaign helping put these issues in front of the people now writing the rules.
We began developing Stop the Forced Feed in 2025 around the principle that recommendation systems themselves needed to become part of online safety. We commissioned original behavioral and public-attitudes research, published the findings, developed the PROTECT framework, and called for content with consent and greater personal control over algorithms.
We then submitted that evidence directly to the European Commission and held successive discussions with officials responsible for digital policy and enforcement. Our conversations focused specifically on algorithmic harm, recommendation systems, and user agency.
Now, the European Commission has adopted a legislative proposal containing concrete measures on safer algorithms, user control, engagement signals, harmful recommendation pathways, and addictive design.
We brought original evidence, a defined policy framework, and a clear set of demands into that debate, and we took them directly to the institution now seeking to write those changes into law.
The KIDS Act therefore represents more than policy alignment for Cybersmile. It is a major campaign victory and the strongest evidence yet that the ideas advanced through Stop the Forced Feed are moving from advocacy into European lawmaking.
User agency is moving toward the mainstream
The KIDS Act is still a proposal and will now proceed through the European legislative process. Its final provisions may change as the European Parliament and Council consider the text.
But something important has already shifted. The question is no longer simply whether harmful content should be removed after it appears. Europe is now proposing rules governing how recommendation systems should behave, what signals they should prioritize, how much control young users should have, and whether platforms should be allowed to design feeds primarily around keeping children engaged.
This is a profound change in the conversation, and it is the direction that we have been pushing through Stop the Forced Feed from the beginning. Our ambition has always gone beyond one platform, one feature, or one age group. We want a lasting transfer of power that gives people meaningful agency over the technologies shaping their online lives.
The KIDS Act does not complete that work, but it represents a major campaign victory and a defining milestone in Stop the Forced Feed's journey from evidence and advocacy into the heart of European policymaking.
Stop the Forced Feed put forward a simple proposition that people, not algorithms, should ultimately decide what they consume online. That principle is no longer sitting at the edge of the debate; it is now being written into proposed EU law.