Australia Plans to Ban Social Media for Young Kids. Who Can Blame Them?
Tech companies have been exploiting kids for years. A reckoning, however flawed, was coming. Here's what's happening and what parents think about it.
Over the summer, I published a piece called “Government Legislation and Regulation Is Coming For Video Games.” It focused on the still pending Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) that may or may not work its way through Congress before the end of the year, but it reflected a broader movement in the U.S. and elsewhere. For too long, social media, technology, and gaming companies have exploited children for profit, and in the coming years, it was clear waves of regulation and legislation acting were coming.
Because these companies have acted so poorly and dangerously in years past, people want blood. They don’t care if the legislation is flawed. They’re demanding change. This does not necessarily lead to good policy, but it’s a recipe for passing a policy.
Now, enter Australia.
On November 28, Australia became the first country to pass a blanket, wide reaching, and potentially unenforceable ban on social media for children under the age of 16. The law, called Online Safety Amendment (Social Media Minimum Age) Bill 2024, goes into effect sometime before the end of 2025, giving platforms time to figure out what the Australian government just passed and how it will try to be implemented.
“Platforms now have a social responsibility to ensure the safety of our kids is a priority for them,” Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese according to the AP.
So far, the ban names Snapchat, X/Twitter, Instagram, Reddit, Facebook, and TikTok. But the Australian government has reserved the right (and likely will) expand the scope of the law’s reach. Facebook Messenger Kids, WhatsApp, YouTube Kids, and others so far are exempt because, those platforms “operate with a significant purpose to enable young people to get the education and health support they need.”
“Historically, there has been a mix of regulation that addresses youth—most often privacy laws, but also consumer, gambling, advertising, even financial regulation,” said Kieran Donovan, CEO of k-ID, a company building tech for developers and parents around this evolving landscape. “More recently we have seen the emergence of online safety regulation. This combination allows services to determine what makes most sense (age-gating, parental oversight, content moderation, spend controls) for their particular platform. We're now seeing the next frontier: highly targeted regulation, focused on youth access, to specific types of apps and services.”
Donovan expects “more” of this “highly targeted regulation” throughout 2025.
In January, TikTok is currently set to be banned in the U.S., but political observers expect [sigh] newly elected President Trump to find a way to keep TikTok operating.
There is no indication (yet) that platforms like Roblox could be banned, as the Australian government has indicated it does not consider games in the same bucket.
But if you have problems with Facebook, you should have problems with Roblox, too?
Time will tell.
How Does It Work?
Good question. Nobody knows yet!
You might suspect it would require showing a government ID, but under criticism over privacy and security concerns, that option was blocked. One alternative might be collecting biometric data, like taking a photo, but we’ve already seen pushback to such technologies in the United States. All of this is why the law isn’t implemented yet.
Another option would be geofencing, using location data, such as being at school.
The Australian government has tried to calm privacy concerns, saying “there will be very strong and strict privacy requirements to protect people's personal information, including an obligation to destroy information provided once age has been verified.”
How will they do that? Stay tuned.
Roblox, a platform overhauling its parental controls and often criticized for how it does/doesn’t protect its young audience, requires an ID to access its most mature content. It’s a painless hoop, and within minutes, I was able to upgrade my account.
Roblox does not, however, require any ID verification to create a Roblox account.
Are You Punished For Violating The Ban?
No.
Unlike alcohol, tobacco, or other underage restrictions, the pressure is off kids.
“The law places the onus on social media platforms—not parents or young people—to take reasonable steps to ensure these protections are in place,” wrote the government, with Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese noting “we know some kids will find workarounds.”
Naturally. These are kids we’re talking about.
Can It Actually Be Enforced?
Maybe.
And maybe it doesn’t matter, depending on who you talk to. But the pressure is real.
“The law actually requires companies deemed to be running social media platforms to take reasonable steps to stop kids under 16 from having accounts,” said Australian tech reporter Cameron Wilson. “This leaves a few holes.”
Wilson pointed out that Australia’s law scrutinizes “accounts, not access.” In other words, public facing content that does not require individuals to log into an account, such as YouTube Shorts or individual TikTok videos, aren’t banned here.
Children will, for now, still have access to such content.
Many Parents Don’t Care If It Actually Works
The baseline criticisms of Australia’s ban fall in line with criticisms of KOSA:
Kids will simply get around the ban.
It doesn’t actually address the underlying problems of social platforms.
It will prevent marginalized groups from finding community online.
“If you put aside the merits of the ban—something that I think is not justified based on what the real experts say—I do think that criticising the ban for not being airtight or perfect is not a fair criticism,” added Wilson. “What other policy do we expect to be 100% perfect? For the people who want the ban, the point is to make it harder for kids, to disrupt their current use, and to encourage them to do other things. I think that's still achieved even if some kids find a way around (which I expect they will, and, honestly, I'm a little bit excited to see how they get around it).”
This is what I found, over and over. Parents just want something, anything done.
“For all its flaws the bill is still extremely popular, because from bullying to disinformation to rampant racism and misogyny, parents are increasingly concerned with their children's social media use,” said Luke Plunkett, who lives in Australia, is an editor at the internet culture website Aftermath, and most notably, is a father to an 14-year-old daughter and 11-year-old son. “Some of the stuff I've seen their friends discussing online, or have been subjected to online, would make your head spin.
Plunkett called the law “a stupid idea” that’s “shot through with loopholes and oversights.” I also had Plunkett ask his children what they thought of the law:
“It sucks,” said his 11-year-old son.
“It's annoying, but I can see why they're doing it,” said his 14-year-old daughter. “I don't think it will work though, everyone will just lie about their age and keep using everything.”
For a long time, the way the internet has handled checking your age is a ridiculous drop down form on a website, where you can input any age you’d like. Nothing stopped you from lying to it. Do you want to be 46 today? Out of habit, I usually end up giving away my personal information and putting in my birthday, and I always laugh when I make the mistake of putting in a date too young and getting locked out.
These are not real guardrails. Real guardrails are complicated and have downsides.
However Australia figures this out will have downsides, some that we can’t foresee.
“Ignoring how effective it will be,” said Australian parent Jake Badger, father to a five-year-old son and a nine-year-old daughter, “it's obviously a bad idea because it further limits the very few ‘third places’ we allow teens to hang out in and pushes those that need those spaces into areas that are less monitored and less protected.”
Children should have places where they can express themselves privately. I had no protections for my online habits as a kid and turned out fine! I even made a career on the internet! But…the internet is a more complicated, dangerous place nowadays.
“My nine-year-old daughter is disappointed because it means she has to wait longer,” said Badger, “but thinks it’s probably a good thing in general as it means ‘we won’t be online where social media can do kids harm.’ It’s apparently not a conversation topic on the playground at all, but she knew about it.”
“It's annoying, but I can see why they're doing it,” said one father’s 14-year-old daughter. “I don't think it will work though, everyone will just lie about their age and keep using everything.”
“I see it like alcohol or smoking,” said an Australian parent of a three-year-old, who asked to be anonymous. “You can get around that too as a kid. I could get beer when I was 16. But there was an acknowledgment that these things are bad. Especially so if your brain is still developing. And social media is no different given how it works.”
I find myself compelled by the basic point that, as a society, we’d be better off taking the stance that these things are not inherently good and make some mistakes regulating them. Start from that position, and learn from what works. I also get to say this knowing my oldest is eight years old and won’t touch social media for a minute, but all told, it’s not that far off; one of her best friends, older by a few years, joined Snapchat because of a sports team they’re on. Friends. Social pressure. That’s near.
“It's pretty clear parents are worried about their kids, and link that concern to technology,” said Wilson, who wrote about the proposed Australia ban for Crikey recently. “I can understand why they'd want to see it banned; as a parent, you tend to think about all the things that could go wrong and weigh as heavily all the benefits of something like this. No parent alive has experienced exactly what it's like to be a teenager in 2024, something that changes so quickly with tech moving rapidly.”
Bans will not necessarily result in better behavior by social platforms. It’s also unlikely to change the behavior of young people, who will simply find other places online.
Wilson made an excellent point about this on Bluesky recently:
Wilson pointed towards Australia’s own Online Safety Act from 2021, which targets online abuse to apply pressure social media platforms. It’s not a ban, it’s not as sexy. Wilson believes it, along with other worldwide pressures on these platforms, is what’s resulted in actual changes, like Meta preventing teens from chatting with unknown adults on Instagram and Facebook. Those shifts will end up protecting young people.
And yet. Parents are pissed off, and young parents are terrified. They do not trust tech companies, and there is no reason to trust tech companies. They’ve lied for years.
“I do think it helps inform culture,” said Adrian Doumaniof, an Australian parent to two boys (three years old, newborn). “By legislating it, they acknowledge it's a serious issue, and positions the government to act against companies who, in my opinion, don't give a shit if social media ruins kids' brains and lives. I doubt the current generation of teens will care. I think the 15 year olds will still be on TikTok after the ban.”
It’s the legislative equivalent of a Hail Mary. It’s better than nothing. It’s something.
“What does social media use look like for my kids in ten years time?” he said. “Hopefully less...rampant?”
That, at least, seems unlikely. The rest is up for grabs.
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Also:
My eight-year-old is on Messenger Kids, but I do not consider that a social network. She basically cannot do anything meaningful without my permission, which is the problem with so many other networks: they start at full permissions!
I suspect the pressure for “more” will come in middle school in a few years, when more kids have access to devices (the “phone” conversation). I’ve got time.
Look, I don’t know where all this stuff ends up, but I am hoping phones are locked down/banned by the time my kid is in high school, at least. But we’ll see.
My problem with social media bans is that it completely gives up on the idea that we can meaningfully force social media platforms to get better - the Australian model, where the fining goes to the companies that are allowing children on the site, is better than the UK legislation that's coming up which would punish families, but even so
I'm in Australia and a parent and I have no confidence this will do anything. Its political grandstanding to make it seem like something is being done but as you've so well said there are so many issues with it.
Verification of identity or age has been tried in other countries on a variety of platforms and all have failed. Which was mentioned in the reports ahead of this law being changed but has essentially been hand waved off.
Social media companies have consistently shown they don't really care about the effects on people whether they be adults or children so the Australian government believing this will make a difference is a complete head in the sand action.
I don't know what the solution is other than parents doing their absolute best to ensure their kids are equipped to deal with these scenarios as well as possible. Which of course isn't ideal and wont be easy, as it wasn't for our parents when we were kids and faced different challenges to our parents generation.