Parliamentary front launches guide for regulating the Digital ECA (Statute of Children and Adolescents).

News report from Agência Câmara de Notícias, published on August 25, 2026.

The Institute for Health Policy Studies (Ieps), Juntô — a Brazilian initiative focused on child and adolescent mental health — and the Joint Parliamentary Front for the Promotion of Mental Health have launched the guide “A gente usa, a gente decide” (We Use It, We Decide). The guide aims to support the implementation of the “Digital ECA” (Digital Child and Adolescent Statute) by centering on the user experience.

Young people from various regions of the country were consulted and formulated 14 recommendations for the law’s regulation, as explained by the parliamentary front’s president, Deputy Pedro Campos (PSB-PE): “The ‘We Use It, We Decide’ guide is crucial for us to engage with decision-makers — those drafting the decrees and implementing the legislation in practice — and to incorporate the youth perspective into this process. It ensures that the digital environment remains a space that safeguards mental health rather than one that causes mental health issues for these populations.”

Núbia Ribeiro, from Juntô, highlighted a common issue raised during conversations with young people: “Many young people reported creating an account and eventually finding themselves unable to leave. They would fall into a negative relationship with the platform, wanting to deactivate their accounts but being unable to do so. We began to realize this was a public policy issue, as it was negatively impacting the lives of many young people across Brazil and the world.”

Guide topics

Check out the guide’s 14 topics:

• Age-appropriate safety and parental supervision;
• Limiting user-retention mechanisms;
• Notifications disabled by default;
• Effective screen-time control;
• Effective and accessible reporting systems;
• Reducing the logic of social competition;
• Well-being-oriented algorithms;
• Protection against cyberbullying and other forms of digital violence;
• Protection against unrealistic appearance standards;
• Media literacy integrated into platforms; transparency and accountability in the use of AI;
• Combating misinformation and misleading content;
• Diversity and informational balance; and
• Design oriented toward healthy development.

The guide “A gente usa, a gente decide” (“We use it, we decide”) can be found on the IEPS website.