Australia has enacted a world-first ban on social media for users aged under 16, causing millions of children and teenagers to lose access to their accounts.
Facebook, Instagram, Threads, X, YouTube, Snapchat, Reddit, Kick, Twitch and TikTok are expected to have taken steps from Wednesday to remove accounts held by users under 16 years of age in Australia, and prevent those teens from registering new accounts.
Platforms that do not comply risk fines of up to $49.5m.
There have been some teething problems with the ban’s implementation. Guardian Australia has received several reports of those under 16 passing the facial age assurance tests, but the government has flagged it is not expecting the ban will be perfect from day one.
All listed platforms apart from X had confirmed by Tuesday they would comply with the ban. The eSafety commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, said it had recently had a conversation with X about how it would comply, but the company had not communicated its policy to users.
Bluesky, an X alternative, announced on Tuesday it would also ban under-16s, despite eSafety assessing the platform as “low risk” due to its small user base of 50,000 in Australia.
Parents of children affected by the ban shared a spectrum of views on the policy. One parent told the Guardian their 15-year-old daughter was “very distressed” because “all her 14 to 15-year-old friends have been age verified as 18 by Snapchat”. Since she had been identified as under 16, they feared “her friends will keep using Snapchat to talk and organise social events and she will be left out”.
Others said the ban “can’t come quickly enough”. One parent said their daughter was “completely addicted” to social media and the ban “provides us with a support framework to keep her off these platforms”.
“The fact that teenagers occasionally find a way to have a drink doesn’t diminish the value of having a clear, national standard.”
Polling has consistently shown that two-thirds of voters support raising the minimum age for social media to 16. The opposition, including leader Sussan Ley, have recently voiced alarm about the ban, despite waving the legislation through parliament and the former Liberal leader Peter Dutton championing it.
The ban has garnered worldwide attention, with several nations indicating they will adopt a ban of their own, including Malaysia, Denmark and Norway. The European Union passed a resolution to adopt similar restrictions, while a spokesperson for the British government told Reuters it was “closely monitoring Australia’s approach to age restrictions”.
On one hand I do think social media has ruined society, and kids should definately not be on it till their brain has matured a bit, on the other hand I worry how corrupt officials could use this in their favor
How could corrupt officials use this? I’m struggling to imagine how.
because not everyone in the country is under 16. So if you're in your 40s and suddenly decide you want to start using tiktok or facebook then you have to provide proof that you're not a teenager. which means providing ID or selfies or both to whomever they use to verify your identity. Now with that info they can now build a profile about what you do online. Also the issue that what happens if this info you've provided is in a data breach. OR they simply sell it to data collection companies.
That and it's a 'social media ban' which is a pretty broad term. Depending how you define social media it could ecompase a lot of other platforms not included in the initial list i.e. Steam, Discord, etc.
This could lead to further restrictions on freedom of speech and anonymity dependent on whatever agenda the government is pushing or to try to control dissent by forcing the poplace to provide some form of ID to access any platform/access the internet.
That may be a leap too far from where we currently are, but it's an important factor to consider as it could have wider reaching consequences if left unchecked.
That being said, I think the large social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter are cesspools that prey on children/teens and are designed to be addictive even for adults.
It's due to that I'm stuck on the fence a little. If anything we as a society should be looking to pressure social media companies to operate ethically.
What has happened instead is that the Australian government has basically pushed the onus on social media companies to block access to these platforms and threatened them with a fine. There's no real plan for implementation, no push for education on social media and its issues.
These laws are written deliberately broad to enable mass censorship. They don't just ban sexual material, but use vague statements like "objectionable material." Actual real-world news is being censored and kept from the eyes of teenagers. Pretty much anything on the Gaza war is considered objectionable material and inappropriate for children to learn about.
I suppose now that "the children are protected", there aren't any roadblocks to more intently exploiting the adults?
Nah. It's not an age issue. It's a social media issue. This stuff is bad for everyone. If you want to protect kids from the dangers of social media, start regulating how social media works for everyone. Why is it ok to start poisoning someone's mind the minute they turn 18?