77% of 13-16 year olds and 38% of 9-12 year olds in the EU have a profile on a social networking site, according to a pan-European survey carried out for the European Commission. Moreover, a quarter of children who use social networking sites like Facebook or Hyves have a profile set as "public" which means that everyone can see it. According to the survey, 70% of the childrens in The Netherlands has a profile in a social network against to 25% in France.

The survey of 25,000 young people in 25 European countries published by the EUKidsOnline network shows 15% of 9-12 year olds say they have more than 100 contacts on their profile, with a high of 47% in Hungary. In 15 out of 25 countries, 9-12 year olds are more likely than 13-16 year olds to have public profiles and many of these display their address and/or phone number. Older youngsters have better skills with 78% of 15-16 year olds saying they know how to change their privacy settings.

The Commission is monitoring the implementation of the Safer Social Networking Principles for the EU, the self-regulatory agreement signed by social networking companies in which they commit to implement a series of measures on their services in order to ensure the safety of minors. However, he report published also shows that some of the social networking sites that are popular among youngsters in Europe are not signatories to the Safer Social Networking Principles.

In addition, the Commission has launched a review of the current industry self-regulatory agreements in the field, given the decreasing age of children using the internet and social networking services and the fact that more children are accessing the internet via mobile devices. This review will start from the Principles and the European Framework for the Safer Mobile Use by Younger Teenagers and Children. Both measures are already part of “Safer Internet Programme”. Social networking companies, manufacturers of mobile devices and game consoles, internet service providers, mobile applications and content providers, consumer organisations, researchers and childrens' organisations are invited to join the collaborative platform.