Latvia

National jurisdiction · as of 2026-09-06

Latvia's national age law sits in the Elektronisko plašsaziņas līdzekļu likums (Electronic Mass Media Law), which transposes the EU Audiovisual Media Services Directive's minor-protection and video-sharing-platform provisions.

A broadcast or on-demand audiovisual service carrying content that could harm a minor's physical, mental, or moral development must either keep it outside a 7:00 to 22:00 watershed or provide restricted access control, preceded by an acoustic warning and marked with a visual content symbol; an on-demand catalogue carries the same restricted-access-control duty.

A video-sharing platform provider must take appropriate measures against content and user-generated commercial communications that could harm minors and must publish its own code of conduct addressing communications aimed at or capable of affecting minors' development. No dedicated social-media minimum-age statute or app-store age-verification duty is on the books as of the date below.

01

Instruments on record

Elektronisko plašsaziņas līdzekļu likums, Articles 23(4) and 24(9)-(10.1), Restricted Access Control for Content Harmful to Minors

In force

Elektronisko plašsaziņas līdzekļu likums, 23. panta ceturtā daļa un 24. panta devītā, desmitā un 10.1 daļa; konsolidētais teksts likumi.lv

Effective 2021-05-11 · Applies to both

Article 24(9) bans distributing audio and audiovisual works depicting physical or psychological violence, bloody or horror scenes, drug use or sexual acts, or containing coarse or indecent language, between 7:00 and 22:00.

Article 24(10) requires an electronic mass medium not observing that watershed for content that could harm a minor's physical, mental, or moral development to instead provide restricted access control, preceded by an acoustic warning signal and marked with a visual symbol describing the content's potentially harmful nature. Article 23(4) imposes the equivalent restricted-access-control duty on an on-demand catalogue offering such content.

Article 24(10.1) bars commercial use of a minor's personal data obtained through that access control, except where necessary to provide the service itself with the data subject's consent.

Source: Full text of law

Elektronisko plašsaziņas līdzekļu likums, Article 23.6, Video-Sharing Platform Minor Protection Measures

In force

Elektronisko plašsaziņas līdzekļu likums, 23.6 pants, pievienots ar 2020. gada 5. novembra likumu, stājas spēkā 01.12.2020.

Effective 2020-12-01 · Applies to private

A video-sharing platform provider, defined by Article 23.5 as an information-society service whose main purpose or an essential function is to provide the public with programmes or user-generated videos it does not edit but organizes and promotes for profit, must take appropriate measures to protect the public from content and user-generated video or audio commercial communications that could harm minors' physical, mental, or moral development, that could incite violence or hatred, or that constitute a listed criminal offence.

It must publish its own publicly accessible code of conduct addressing commercial communications aimed at or capable of negatively affecting the psychological or physical development of minors, including in children's programming.

Source: Full text of law