An integrated national methodology to ensure children’s safe use of interactive digital platforms

The “Children’s Digital Safety” Forum stressed the importance of establishing “digital judicial sovereignty” in a way that keeps pace with the nature of cross-border digital crimes and enhances the protection of children in the digital environment, noting that the law recently issued by the UAE government regarding the digital safety of children represents an advanced legislative model and sets clear obligations on digital platforms.

The Chairman of the UAE Government Cybersecurity Council, Dr. Mohammed Al Kuwaiti, pointed out that the UAE ranks first globally in the cybersecurity index, identifying four basic pillars of child protection on the Internet.

In detail, the Abu Dhabi Judicial Department concluded the activities of the “Child Digital Safety” Forum, which was held under the slogan “Towards a safe and sustainable digital environment for future generations,” by discussing the institutional and societal dimensions of child protection in the digital space, which contributes to consolidating institutional integration and raising community awareness of the legislation developed with the entry into force of Federal Decree Law No. (26) of 2025 regarding child digital safety.

The second day of the forum, whose sessions were moderated by the Director of the Public Prosecutions Department in Abu Dhabi, Counselor Hassan Al Hammadi, via the virtual platform of the Abu Dhabi Judicial Academy, witnessed a review of a number of topics related to child security in the digital space, the roles of government agencies and social media platforms, in addition to the relevant legal and legislative dimensions.

The Chairman of the Cybersecurity Council of the UAE Government, Dr. Mohammed Al Kuwaiti, during his review of a working paper on “Cybersecurity in the Digital Environment and its Role in Child Protection,” confirmed that the UAE is first in the world in the Cybersecurity Index according to the “Global Celebrity Index” report, which measures infrastructure in cybersecurity based on five axes that include: capacity development procedures, technical and technological procedures, regulatory procedures, and legal procedures, in addition to cooperation procedures.

He stated that statistics on cyber threats in the United Arab Emirates (2024-2025) show that the country is exposed daily to more than 200,000 cyber attacks that are being confronted, behind which are organized crime groups, active hackers, and state-backed entities, in addition to internal threats. He identified four pillars for child protection online, which included: targeted awareness, cybersecurity education, and national policies, in addition to the governance of securing gaming platforms, noting that there is an integrated national methodology to ensure children’s safe use of interactive digital platforms based on strategic partnerships to protect children in the digital space, future legislative transformations to enhance children’s safe use of communication platforms, and the launch of intensive awareness programs in the year of the family and the year of society, in addition to managing communication and conversation features and additional measures in games and interactive platforms such as the Roblox game.

For his part, the Director of the Abu Dhabi Judicial Academy, Counselor Dr. Sami Al-Toukhi, put forward a package of recommendations that included: holding platforms accountable for proactive safety measures and not just for the content after it is published, making protection the automatic mode for children’s accounts, in line with the Emirati model, establishing independent national regulatory bodies, enabling the judiciary to interpret laws in a way that achieves maximum protection for children in the digital environment, granting courts the authority to issue binding recommendations for platforms to fill technical gaps, and ensuring the ability of national courts to hold foreign platforms that target local users accountable.

The recommendations included an international aspect, including: updating the Budapest Convention, “developing the agreement to include clear obligations on platforms with regard to child protection,” establishing an independent international organization to set digital safety standards, suggesting that Abu Dhabi be its headquarters, and establishing an international Internet court specialized in adjudicating disputes between countries and digital platforms, to be hosted by Abu Dhabi, in addition to artificial intelligence governance and developing international protocols to ensure the development and use of artificial intelligence systems in a safe and ethical manner for children.

The Vice President of the National Commission for Human Rights, Dr. Fatima Al-Kaabi, confirmed that Federal Decree Law 26/2025 regarding child digital safety is in excellent agreement with international and regional standards, as it embodies the principles of the Convention on the Rights of the Child and its protocols through a modern legal system, and keeps pace with UNICEF guidelines and decisions of leading countries with binding and advanced implementation mechanisms. It also represents a qualitative legislative precedent. In the Arab and regional context, no Arab country has ever issued a specialized and integrated law that addresses child safety in the digital space in this way. Detail and comprehensiveness, and at the global level, the UAE law also comes within the new generation of “digital security” laws that have begun to appear in recent years, but it is distinguished by some pioneering uniqueness, including that the UAE is one of the first countries to include an explicit obligation to provide technical parental control tools, and to criminalize some new practices such as the phenomenon of “negative exploitation of children across platforms,” which includes parents’ misuse of children’s images or information on the Internet.

Child protection in cyberspace

The head of cybersecurity for the UAE government, Dr. Mohammed Al Kuwaiti, stressed that protecting children in cyberspace is among the most important vital tasks in light of rapid technological developments.

He stressed the need to continue educating society and institutions to ensure the optimal use of cyberspace, which contributes to the interconnectedness of the digital environment and infrastructure system that characterizes the UAE, which is considered one of the countries most prepared and ready to deal with threats in cyberspace, thanks to its advanced infrastructure, and its adoption of proactive visions based on scientific and realistic anticipation of the future, stressing at the same time that the Council launched a number of initiatives, training programs and campaigns that contributed to raising the level of digital culture, and enabling future generations to face digital challenges.

• 200,000 cyberattacks that the UAE confronts every day are behind organized crime groups, hackers, and entities supported by states, in addition to internal threats.