Australia has kicked off a landmark process by announcing the world’s first national teen social media ban (for children aged under 16), setting a benchmark for global jurisdictions with one of the toughest regulations targeting Big Tech. The law forces tech giants from Instagram and Facebook owner Meta to TikTok to stop minors logging in or face fines of up to A$49.5mn ($32mn). A trial of methods to enforce it will start in January with the ban to take effect in a year.
Now comes the interesting part. Software testers hired by Australia’s government to determine how to enforce the ban have worked on defence and election contracts but will use another experience to guide their study: wrangling their own children online, Reuters reported. Andrew Hammond, general manager at tech contractor KJR said the company will conduct the trial on about 1,200 randomly chosen Australians from January to March. The study, one of the biggest ever trials of age-checking technology, will likely set the course for lawmakers and tech platforms around the world as they navigate a push to age-restrict social media at a time of growing concern about youth mental health and data collection.
From late 2025, platforms including Meta’s Instagram, Elon Musk’s X, TikTok and Snapchat must show Australians they are taking reasonable steps to keep out users under 16 or face fines. Google’s YouTube, a classroom staple, is exempt. But the legislation does not specify what those reasonable steps must be. That is down to the trial, overseen by the Age Check Certification Scheme, a British consulting firm, which expects about 12 participating tech firms and must give recommendations by mid-2025.
Options include age estimation where a user’s video selfie is biometrically analysed then deleted; age verification where a user uploads identifying documents to a third-party provider which sends an anonymous confirmation “token” to the platform; and age inference where a user’s e-mail address is cross-checked with other accounts.
“The approach the Australian government takes could influence how other countries approach online age checks for social media content,” said Julie Dawson, chief policy and regulatory officer at age-verification company Yoti, which does age checks for Meta’s new system of heightened privacy settings for teenage Instagram users.
Some European countries and US states have legislated age minimums for social media, but none has rolled out an enforcement regime due to legal challenges based on preserving privacy and free speech.
Even lawmakers in Australia’s conservative opposition, whose support was needed to get the centre-left government’s ban through parliament, warned the ban could justify collecting personal information – an echo of a November post from X owner Elon Musk that it “seems like a backdoor way to control access to the Internet by all Australians”.
Communications Minister Michelle Rowlands told parliament the ban was “not about government mandating any form of technology or demanding any personal information handed over to social media companies”. A last-minute change to the law stipulates that platforms asking for identifying documents must offer an alternative age-gate.
Pressure to block minors from parts of the Internet has been around since pornography and gambling websites overran the early worldwide web. It has taken on a new urgency since a Meta whistleblower leaked internal e-mails in 2021 purportedly showing knowledge its products were harmful to young users. Meta has said the documents were misinterpreted.
Rising demand has spurred technological development, but no product yet is fool-proof when it comes to combining accuracy, privacy, security and user-friendliness, said Tony Allen, CEO of the Age Check Certification Scheme, which will test products for Australia on those criteria. How Australia implements the ban is definitely going to be an interesting case study for the rest of the world.