The regulatory wave

The EU's Digital Services Act imposed new transparency, point-of-contact, and content-moderation obligations on Reddit, which self-reports tens of millions of EU users but has not been formally designated a Very Large Online Platform.

Canada's Bill C-63, the Online Harms Act introduced in February 2024, proposed sweeping duties on social-media operators — covering platforms such as Reddit — before lapsing when Parliament was dissolved.

On 25 July 2025 Reddit began requiring UK users to verify their age with government ID or a face scan to view adult and other 'mature' content, triggering a backlash over privacy and over-blocking of support communities.

Through 2025 the UK regulator Ofcom opened dozens of Online Safety Act investigations and issued its first fines, establishing an enforcement regime that age-gated platforms such as Reddit must comply with or face penalties up to 10% of global turnover.

From 10 December 2025 Australia required Reddit and nine other platforms to take reasonable steps to prevent under-16s from holding accounts, backed by penalties up to A$49.5 million and overseen by the eSafety Commissioner.

In December 2025 Reddit filed a constitutional challenge in the High Court of Australia, arguing the country's under-16 social-media ban and age-verification mandate burden the implied freedom of political communication.

On 26 June 2025 Brazil's Supreme Federal Court held part of the Marco Civil da Internet unconstitutional, replacing a court-order-only liability shield with a fault-based regime that sweeps in platforms such as Reddit.

The Netherlands' data-protection authority opened a GDPR investigation into Reddit's licensing of user content to AI developers; after Reddit allegedly stopped cooperating, it lost a court challenge in The Hague in early 2026 over the regulator's handling of privileged material.