Age assurance community sets new goals with standard published and use exploding

“Age Assurance Has Come of Age,” crows the Draft Summit Communiqué for the upcoming Global Age Assurance Standards Summit 2026. Accordingly, this year’s Summit will focus on the practical implementation of age verification, age estimation and age inference systems by relying parties.

The draft was shared on LinkedIn by Tony Allen, executive director of the Age Check Certification Scheme (ACCS), which organizes the conference.

The preamble concludes “that age assurance has entered a phase of global implementation in which standards, regulation, certification and enforcement must operate coherently to protect children’s rights while preserving privacy, proportionality and trust in the digital environment.”

The new communique includes six principles, as a new one on “Human Rights and the Best Interests of the Child” has been added to last year’s list of principles.

Principles on “Risk-based and Proportionate Implementation,” “Digital Inclusion and Accessibility” and privacy have added nuance but are largely unchanged. The principle on standards-based interoperability now includes “and Technical Integrity.” Transparency and accountability were matched with innovation last year, which is now replaced with “Independent Assurance.”

Chief among the changes in context that enables these shifts in the guiding principles is the publication of ISO/IEC 27566-1. The communique notes that 27566-2 and 27566-3 are currently in development, and that the standards will help with comparing systems,  making procurement choices, keeping regulatory guidance consistent, and establishing a basis for certification and audits.

The calls to action have evolved significantly with the ISO standard in place.

One on encouraging adoption of the standard has been replaced with one to align enforcement around it. The 2026 edition also calls for a shift “from Deployment to Demonstrable Assurance.”

Action points on privacy and mutual recognition have been replaced with calls to avoid enabling surveillance and address global interoperability.

In line with the new first principle, the most impactful call to action may be to embed human rights impact assessments in the process of deploying age assurance.

The Summit organizers are now taking feedback on the draft, and the communique will be edited until the final version is produced on the last day of the Summit.

The Global Age Assurance Standards Summit 2026 will be held in Manchester, UK from April 14 to 16. Registration is open now, and Biometric Update will report on the Summit from live on location.

Article Topics

age assurance standard  |  Age Assurance Standards Summit (2026)  |  Age Check Certification Scheme (ACCS)  |  age verification  |  biometric age estimation  |  ISO 27566-1  |  ISO 27566-3