EU Digital Fairness Act draft would limit profiling-based ads and pricing, ban paid loot boxes for minors and set 4% turnover fines

The European Commission's proposed Digital Fairness Act would set EU-wide limits on two practices that online businesses depend on: targeting ads through profiling and personalising prices. It would also ban paid loot-box-style rewards for minors. National regulators would have to be able to impose fines of at least 4% of a trader's turnover in the member states concerned. The Commission published the proposal on November 11, 2026, as COM(2026) 1100 final (interinstitutional file 2026/0356(COD)). It now goes to the European Parliament and the Council.

Profiling-based ads and personalised prices

Article 12 would bar traders from targeting ads at a consumer through profiling, as defined in the GDPR, in two cases: when they use the personal data of someone they know with reasonable certainty is a minor, or when they use special categories of personal data under Article 9(1) of the GDPR. Those categories include health data. The article says compliance does not require traders to process extra personal data to work out whether a consumer is a minor. It does not apply to online platforms already covered by the advertising rules in Section 3 of Chapter III of the Digital Services Act.

Article 13 would bar traders from personalising prices through profiling in a way "reasonably likely to cause harm" when they know with reasonable certainty that the consumer is a minor. The same applies when they know the consumer is vulnerable "due to their age, credulity, disability, or any specific misfortune or circumstance of such gravity as to impair the consumer's judgment."

Loot boxes and other paid random rewards

The draft defines "paid-for variable reward systems" in Article 3(18) as virtual items, "other than financial products," that offer random rewards or variable odds and are bought with money or with paid-for virtual currencies. Recital 63 names loot boxes, wheels of fortune and collectible card packs as examples. It says such systems "share the speculative features of gambling."

Under Article 15, traders offering these systems would have to tell consumers what types of items are available and the probability of obtaining them. They would also have to give consumers easily accessible tools to switch the systems off. Where a product is aimed at minors, or the trader knows with reasonable certainty that minors use it, the trader could not offer paid variable rewards to minors. Article 3(16) defines a minor as anyone under 18. That ban would not apply to social networks, video-sharing platforms, AI companions or general chatbots that fall under the parallel prohibition in Article 13(2) of the proposed EU Kids Act.

Article 16 would also bar "pay-to-progress and pay-to-win" purchases for minors on the same terms. Under Article 14(2), paid-for virtual currencies would be switched off by default for minors and could only be turned on with a parent's or guardian's approval.

Influencer marketing and addictive design

Article 11 would require influencer marketing to carry the label "advertisement" or "commercial collaboration." It would bar influencer marketing of products whose advertising to consumers is prohibited under EU or national law. Recital 55 lists "speculative instruments, betting, lotteries or other forms of gambling products" among products that may be unsuitable for consumers in general or for minors.

Article 17 would require traders whose digital products are designed in a way that can reasonably be foreseen to encourage compulsive or excessive use to let consumers switch off autoplay, unprompted notifications, rewards for regular engagement and features that simulate interpersonal relationships.

Recital 12 says the regulation is without prejudice to national authorisation regimes, "including those rules which, in conformity with Union law, relate to gambling activities."

Fines and timeline

Under the penalties article, member states would have to be able to fine widespread infringements and widespread infringements with a Union dimension. The maximum fine would have to be at least 4% of the trader's annual turnover in the member state or states concerned. Where turnover information is not available, the maximum would have to be at least EUR 2 million. For infringements the Commission investigates itself under the proposed revised Consumer Protection Cooperation Regulation, it could impose fines of up to 6% of the trader's worldwide annual turnover.

Under Article 40, the regulation would enter into force 20 days after publication in the Official Journal and apply 12 months after that. Parliament and the Council must first agree on a final text, so no application date has been set.

For background on how regulators treat paid random-reward mechanics that let players cash out prizes, see AskSpinner's explainer What is gacha gambling? For a recent enforcement case against influencer promotion of gambling, see Indonesian police arrest admin of MLM-style Instagram network promoting online gambling sites.