The crux of the matter is not piracy or location masking for cheaper subscriptions. This time, the trigger is the protection of children online. Under the auspices of the Digital Services Act, the European Commission has prepared guidelines for the protection of minors and a prototype age-verification application. The aim is to allow users to prove that they are over 18, for example when accessing adult content, without having to reveal their full identity or exact age. The Commission emphasises that the solution should protect privacy, give users control over their personal data and prevent the content they visit from being tracked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On paper, this is a rational goal. No one would seriously argue that children should be allowed to access pornographic sites, betting platforms or other services where the law requires them to be of legal age. The problem arises in implementation. If a website checks the age of a user based on the country from which they are accessing, a VPN can quickly change the picture. The user can connect via a server outside the EU or outside a country with strict rules and the system no longer treats them as a local user. The European Parliamentary Research Service has therefore noted that the use of VPNs has increased markedly in countries where legal age verification systems have been introduced, and noted that some advocate restricting access to VPN services to users above a certain digital age.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With this mindset, things can get complicated. A VPN isn't just about circumventing regulations. A VPN is also a layer of security. If the regulator sees circumvention as the primary goal, the security part quickly becomes collateral damage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Many headlines make it sound as if the EU is already preparing a ban on VPNs. This is an exaggeration. It is more accurate to say that European institutions and politicians recognise VPNs as an obstacle to the implementation of age restrictions. The European Parliamentary Research Service, in a paper on VPNs and child protection, noted that VPNs are used to circumvent online age verification methods and highlighted the debate on whether access to VPN services should be restricted to users above the digital age of majority. This is not a law, it is not a ban and it is not a direct order to member states, but it is a signal of where thinking is heading.<\/p>\n\n\n\n To me, this shift seems more important than the word \u201cban.\u201d A ban is legally clear, politically explosive, and technically difficult to implement. Restriction, on the other hand, is more elusive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It could mean age verification before using a VPN. It could mean obligations for VPN service providers. It could mean blocking known VPN servers from accessing certain sites. It could mean pressure on app stores. It could mean requiring platforms to implement \u201creasonable measures\u201d against circumvention, without a clear definition of what is reasonable and what is excessive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If a country imposes age verification and then every teenager bypasses it with a free VPN app, the law loses credibility. Age restrictions only work if they are difficult to circumvent. Otherwise, the entire regulation turns into an adult show, and kids quickly learn which app they need to install.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The debate about VPNs is also ongoing in the UK, which has already implemented age verification systems, and the US state of Utah. Both have seen a huge increase in VPN usage since the introduction of age verification.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The EU will have a very difficult time finding a solution that satisfies the demands of adults, silences users who are primarily concerned about online privacy, and at the same time makes the same solution unbreakable for children.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The European Commission describes its solution as privacy-friendly. It would allow users to prove they are over 18 without revealing more personal data than necessary. The solution would be interoperable with future European digital wallets, and member states would be able to adapt it to their needs without changing its privacy protections.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This is a good goal, but it does not eliminate all concerns. Age verification is not just about what the system promises, but also about who operates it, how its security is verified, which providers are involved, how long the data is kept, whether there are access logs, and what happens when misuse occurs. With identity technologies, mistakes are rarely small. If a user trusts a system to prove age alone, and the system later becomes a broader ticket to access the Internet, the very nature of anonymous browsing changes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Therefore, the debate about VPNs is really a debate about how much identity will be needed for normal web use in the future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A ban on VPNs in the EU would be extremely difficult to implement. First of all, because VPNs are not a single product. There are commercial applications, enterprise VPN systems, private servers, corporate network solutions, browser security features, and protocols that cannot be easily distinguished from legitimate encrypted traffic. Blocking known VPN addresses is possible, but providers can change them. Deep scanning of traffic opens up new privacy and security issues. Banning apps from stores does not stop installations from other sources, but it also affects ordinary users more than the technically savvy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Politically, a complete ban would be even more difficult. The European Union likes to portray itself as a place of fundamental rights, data protection and digital privacy. VPNs are often used to protect these very values. If the EU were to go down the path of a blanket ban, it would be hard to explain the difference between protecting children and generally restricting privacy tools.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The debate is often framed too simply. On one side are those who want to protect children, and on the other side are those who defend VPNs. This is a poor frame. Protecting children is a legitimate task. Privacy is also a legitimate right. The question is not which value should trump another, but whether it is possible to build a system that does not dismantle the entire security ecosystem because of one problem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If I had to choose the right question, I would ask it differently: How do we prevent minors from accessing content that is not appropriate for them without creating an infrastructure for mass identity verification and limiting privacy tools? This question is harder, but more honest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The EU is not banning VPNs for now. But the discussion about them is no longer peripheral. When VPNs emerge in official conversations as a \u201cloophole\u201d that needs to be closed, users rightly become wary. Not because every VPN app will be banned tomorrow, but because the internet can change in layers. First, age verification for adult content. Then requirements against circumvention. Then restrictions on tools that enable these circumventions. Then new areas where something other than age must be proven.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I hope that Europe will find a path that does not lead to digital totalitarianism, but the current signals are anything but encouraging.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Uporabljali so ga zaposleni za dostop do slu\u017ebenih sistemov, novinarji za za\u0161\u010dito virov, popotniki za varnej\u0161o uporabo javnih omre\u017eij in uporabniki, ki niso \u017eeleli, da vsaka spletna stran takoj vidi njihov IP naslov. Zdaj pa se je isti pripomo\u010dek zna\u0161el v precej druga\u010dnem politi\u010dnem kontekstu. V razpravah o preverjanju starosti na spletu se VPN vse […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[74,30,66,4,12],"tags":[1113],"class_list":["post-7575","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aplikacije","category-mrezna-oprema","category-programi","category-racunalnistvo-telefonija","category-triki-nasveti","tag-vpn"],"acf":{"subtitle":"VPN je bil \u0161e pred kratkim skoraj dolgo\u010dasen varnostni pripomo\u010dek. ","heading":"","summary":"Popolna prepoved VPN-jev trenutno ni na mizi kot sprejet evropski zakon, je pa jasno, da se v Evropi odpira razprava o omejevanju uporabe VPN-jev pri dostopu do vsebin, za katere se uvaja preverjanje starosti.","thumbnail_small":"https:\/\/racunalniske-novice.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/ChatGPT-Image-May-10-2026-03_55_34-PM-560x315.png","thumbnail_large":"https:\/\/racunalniske-novice.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/ChatGPT-Image-May-10-2026-03_55_34-PM-1024x576.png","thumbnail_caption":"","gallery":"","video_gallery":null,"author":"","links":null,"sources":null,"skip_language":[]},"yoast_head":"\n![\"\"](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/guillaume-perigois-wVqC9dty3VQ-unsplash-1024x683.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nWhat does the European Union say?<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Why would anyone want to restrict a VPN?<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/zulfugar-karimov-gETrmMc0G_I-unsplash-1-1024x683.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nAge verification has a trust problem<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
A complete ban would be technically and politically problematic<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
"VPN yes or no?"<\/strong> is the wrong question<\/h3>\n\n\n\n