Greece Is Developing an App To Halt Child Internet Addiction

On December 30, Greek Minister of Digital Governance Dimitris Papastergiou announced the development of the “Youth Wallet” app, part of a broader initiative to improve children’s digital well-being. This new tool aims to reduce minors’ screen time, enhance parental controls, and strengthen age verification.

“Children have forgotten to live normally, they have forgotten to play, they have forgotten that they have friends, they forget to talk, and they talk through screens and messages,” said Papastergiou in an interview with ERT, the public Greek broadcaster. “This should concern us much more intensely, and we should take measures,” he continued.

This announcement follows a survey by KMOP, a prominent Greek research organization. The survey found that 58.8% of children between 9 and 12 use social media daily, and 22.8% have encountered inappropriate content. The authors also stated that many young users don’t know how to use essential safety tools like block and report buttons.

The Youth Wallet app is designed to work seamlessly with another tool for parents’ devices that went live soon after the initial announcement. In addition to limiting screen time and blocking harmful websites, it tackles the tricky issue of age verification by allowing parents to set their children’s ages on their phones.

“When you have an (online) age check, you might have a 14-year-old claiming they are 18. Or you could have someone who actually is a genuine 20-year-old … Now we can address that,” said Papastergiou, as reported by the AP.

Although religious and digital rights groups have criticized the move, public sentiment toward these youth safety measures remains largely supportive. This policy also provides an alternative to more restrictive approaches across the EU, such as France’s ban on all social media for children under 15 or Australia’s ban on TikTok for children under 16.

“Can a total ban on social media for children be effective? I doubt it,” said Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.

The Ministry of Digital Governance expects to have the Youth Wallet app ready by March and hopes to see it pre-installed on all smartphones sold in Greece by the end of 2025.