This commitment was put to a real-world test in early 2025 when the UK's Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) fined Reddit for failing to have robust age verification measures. Regulators found that without proper age checks, Reddit had no lawful basis for processing the data of children under 13. The debate this sparked—between children's safety advocates and privacy experts who warned that intrusive age checks themselves pose a risk to user privacy—highlights the complex ethical landscape of data protection.