The Minister of Digital Transformation and Public Service, José Luis Escrivá, today presented Cartera Digital Beta, a mobile application that includes an age verification system for accessing adult content.
Cartera Digital Beta will be a mobile application that will securely store adult credentials issued by the Spanish Government, to be presented to the adult content platform at the start of the session. The system incorporates double authentication to prevent minors from accessing adult devices. The application will include additional features from its launch and will gradually integrate new utilities.
Once the design phase of the instrument was concluded with the publication of the technical specifications, the minister declared that the current development phase “will last just over two months, so as to be available to all citizens by the end of the summer”.
Worrying data on access to inappropriate content
Escrivá stressed that “the data we see on minors’ access to adult content and its possible consequences are what led us to develop this tool as quickly as possible.” He praised the “fantastic work” done by the inter-ministerial working group launched in March to develop the tool, which “will provide users with a solution in record time.” The working group’s president, Carmen Cabanillas, director general of Public Governance, accompanied the minister in the presentation.
The minister highlighted some “worrying” data on access to pornography by minors, such as the fact that 7 out of 10 adolescents regularly consume pornographic material in Spain or that the first access occurs between the ages of 9 and 11. According to data from the Ministry of the Interior and the Ministry of Youth and Children, access occurs mainly through mobile phones, either through instant messaging, web pages or social networks.
“The consequences of this access to adult content are very serious and affect all of us,” Escrivá emphasized, emphasizing that the vast majority of young people between 18 and 26 believe that this content is faithful to real sexuality and for many it is their only source of affective-sexual information, pushing them to act out of imitation and, in some cases, out of domination of men over women.
“All of this, according to the studies analyzed in the working group, causes distortions in the perception of sexuality, emotional and sexual problems and the risk of addiction,” the minister said, also highlighting a 116% increase in sexual assaults committed by minors in the last five years. “The age verification system that we are presenting today is one of the most necessary and effective measures to combat this problem,” Escrivá emphasized.
There is also a broad consensus at European level on the need to protect minors in the digital sphere, as demonstrated by the Leuven Declaration and the document entitled “Empowering citizens and businesses in the digital transformation through a streamlined and ambitious use of the EUDI Wallet”.
The app with which the Government will prevent minors from watching porn
Furthermore, Cartera Digital Beta is part of the eIDAS2 standard, which establishes the obligation for content platforms to accept the use of European digital identity wallets by October 2027.
