We want to protect children and young people when using digital media. We pursue a three-pillar strategy to do this:

• We provide attractive, age-appropriate offers for children. We give parents and legal guardians the information they need in order to be able to protect their children against inappropriate content.
• We participate in combating child abuse and its depiction to the extent that this is permitted within the European and national legal frameworks.
• We implement various measures to ensure that young people acquire media skills and can interact safely with online content.

We also collaborate closely with prosecuting authorities and NGOs as well as other partners from business, politics, and society to ban online content that is harmful to children and young people. We have anchored our commitment to protecting minors from unsuitable media content in Germany in relevant codes and introduced minimum standards. In 2007, we committed ourselves to fighting child pornography on the internet throughout the European Union. GSMA (an association representing the interests of mobile operators worldwide), of which we have been a member since 2008, pursues the same objectives at a global level.

To better coordinate our activities within the Group, we have been following binding general guidelines since 2013 for our activities to help protect minors against inappropriate media content, and thereby setting standards in our markets in the process. In consideration of their particular cultural situation and business model, each international subsidiary in the European Union can further specify these measures and adopt additional measures to determine their own strategic focal points.

Cooperation with organizations for the protection of minors
Protecting minors from unsuitable media content poses a challenge that affects many industries. We therefore work together with different organizations for the protection of minors and participate in coalitions that coordinate the involvement of companies and organizations from the internet and media sector.

• For example, we are a member of the “Alliance to better protect minors online,” which has set out to make the internet a safer place for kids.
• We have also taken a leading role in the “ICT  Coalition for Children Online.” In this coalition, we pursue a comprehensive and cross-industry approach based on six principles that expressly includes helping young people learn media skills.

Since 2013, in the framework of the two cooperative efforts, we have been implementing an EU-wide package of measures based on the principles of the ICT Coalition. We provide transparent and regular information on its implementation. Most recently, we provided such information in 2021, in our ICT Coalition report. The ICT Coalition had first published an annual report in 2014 on the implementation of corresponding measures at all of the companies represented in the ICT Coalition. This report was written by an independent expert from the Dublin Institute of Technology, and comes to the conclusion that Deutsche Telekom’s approach to implementing the ICT Coalition’s principles is exemplary.

Online “Safer Internet for Kids” campaign
The internet is part of our daily life – for children too. To make sure they are safe online, children need to be aware of what to avoid. As part of the educational project “Online, being informed is being protected,” we started an online campaign for social media in early 2022. As part of the “Safer Internet for Kids” campaign, Telekom Romania explained the dangers of the internet, making parents and children more aware of the risks. We set up a survey on LinkedIn and Facebook and published six video tutorials. Each video included relevant information and useful tips from an expert – including on the topics of cyber bullying , online safety, and how to spend less time online. The campaign reached over 1 million users on both platforms.