The Regulation on the Provision of Differentiated Services Specific to Children and Age Verification by Social Network Providers (“Regulation”) was published in the Official Gazette dated 10 October 2026 and numbered 33396. The Regulation will enter into force on 1 November 2026.
The Regulation aims to establish the procedures and principles governing age verification for access to social network services, the provision of differentiated services for children aged 15 and above, and parental control tools.
The Regulation covers all social network providers based in Türkiye or abroad that are accessible from Türkiye, as well as their users. The new provisions prohibit social network providers from providing services to children under the age of 15.Age verification through the e-Government Gateway (e-Devlet) has become mandatory when creating an account, and a more protective service model has been introduced for children aged 15 to under 18. In this context, “differentiated services” means social network services provided through security, privacy, content delivery, algorithmic, communication and parental control measures appropriate to children’s ages and developmental levels. These rules are summarized below.
Provision of Services to Children Under 15 Prohibited
The Regulation defines social network providers as “natural or legal persons that enable users to create, view or share content, such as text, images, audio and location information, on the internet for the purpose of social interaction.” Accordingly, social network providers, such as Instagram, X, TikTok and Facebook, will not be permitted to provide services to children under the age of 15 and will be required to reject their requests to create accounts. Users aged 15 to under 18 may only be offered differentiated services specific to children.
Age Verification to Be Carried Out Through e-Devlet
When an account is created, the user’s age group must be verified using an age verification token obtained through e-Devlet. The token will only indicate whether the user has reached the age of 15 and, if so, whether they have reached the age of 18. It may not be used for any purpose other than age verification. Social network providers must also apply additional age verification methods throughout the provision of services. Where there are reasonable grounds to suspect that an account is being used inconsistently with its verified age range, the account must be suspended and re-verification using a token will be required.
Users who are not resident in Türkiye and are temporarily present in the country are exempt from the age verification control mechanisms under the Regulation. To enable these users to access services in Türkiye, an exceptional token will be generated upon application through e-Devlet, using only passport information without e-Devlet identity authentication.
Protective Service Model Introduced for Children Aged 15 and Above
Certain restrictions will apply to services offered to children aged 15 and above. Children’s accounts must remain private and may not be made public. Communication and interaction with children will be restricted, services that may lead to addiction may not be offered, and children’s data may not be used for profiling or personalized commercial advertising. Children’s accounts may not offer live streaming or features that present visual content sequentially.
In addition, high privacy settings must apply by default, and data processing must be kept to a minimum. Contracts, user settings and data policies must be presented in language children can understand. Content filtering and recommendation system settings must be applied to reduce exposure to content that may harm children’s development.
Parental Control Tools Made Mandatory
Social network providers must offer parental control tools that enable legal representatives to manage account and privacy settings, make paid transactions subject to permission or approval, set spending limits, restrict usage time and control location sharing. Security measures must prevent children from disabling or removing parental control authority, or changes made under that authority, without the parent’s knowledge and the same security verification. Providing these tools does not remove the obligation to offer differentiated services specific to children
Application and Objection Mechanism Made Mandatory
Social network providers must establish a free and accessible application and objection mechanism with a Turkish language option to challenge age verification results, account suspension or closure, and measures applied within differentiated services. Applications and objections may not be reviewed entirely by automated systems and must undergo meaningful human review. Account content and personal data may not be deleted until the process is concluded.
Existing Accounts Granted a Transition Period Until 31 March 2027
Existing accounts opened before the Regulation enters into force and not verified using an age verification token must undergo token-based age verification at least once by 31 March 2027. Accounts belonging to users found to be under 15 must be closed after notification. Where an application or objection is submitted, the relevant data must be deleted after the process is concluded; otherwise, the data must be deleted without delay. Existing accounts belonging to children aged 15 and above will be subject to the differentiated service rules.
Sanctions
Failure to comply with the obligations will result in sanctions against social network providers pursuant to the relevant provisions of Additional Article 4 of Law No. 5651.
Before sanctions are imposed, providers must be notified of the non-compliance and given a reasonable period to remedy it, depending on its nature.
The full text of the Regulation is available
here.
Aslı Kınsız, Managing Associate
Sevim Özkan, Associate
Yiğit Ali Keleş, Trainee Lawyer