The Australian government has banned access to social media by children under the age of 16 . <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Norwegian government recently proposed raising the age at which children can consent to the terms required to use social media to 15 years from 13 years currently, although parents would still be permitted to sign off on their behalf if they are under the age limit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The centre-left government also said it had begun work on legislation to set an absolute legal minimum age limit for social media use, but it was not immediately clear when a law mandating this may reach parliament.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In 2023, France passed a law requiring social platforms to obtain parental consent for minors under 15 to create accounts. However, local media say technical challenges mean it has not yet enforced.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Officially, minors between the ages of 13 and 16 are allowed to use social media in Germany only if their parents give consent. There are currently no plans to go further. However, child protection advocates say controls are insufficient and call for existing rules to be better implemented.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Australians using a range of social media platforms including Facebook,\u00a0Instagram<\/a>, YouTube, Snapchat and X will need to have their age checked to ensure they are 16 or older when the social media ban comes into effect from early December.<\/p>\n\n\n\n From 10 December, new laws will apply to platforms that meet the government\u2019s definition of an \u201cage-restricted social media platform\u201d, which has the sole or significant purpose of enabling social interaction with two or more users, and which allows users to post material on the service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The government has not specified by name any platforms that will be included in the ban, meaning any site that meets the above definition could be included except if they meet the exemptions released on Wednesday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, has said that the covered platforms include \u2013 but are not limited to \u2013 Facebook, Instagram, X, Snapchat, and YouTube.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Platforms that have not been named by the government but do not meet the exemption criteria will also need to consider whether they need to bring in age assurance by December. This would include services such as Bluesky, Donald Trump\u2019s Truth Social platform, Discord and Twitch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The communications minister, Anika Wells, said these platforms would be expected to take reasonable steps to deactivate accounts for users under 16, prevent children registering new accounts, check ages, and also prevent workarounds to bypass the restrictions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The government said platforms would be exempt if they had the primary purpose of:<\/p>\n\n\n\n It will be up to the eSafety commissioner<\/a> to determine which platforms meet the criteria for an exemption.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In practice, this means that LinkedIn, WhatsApp, Roblox, and Coursera would likely be exempt if assessed to meet the criteria. LinkedIn had previously argued to the government it was not of interest to children.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In theory, it could also mean YouTube Kids could be exempt from the ban if it meets the criteria for an exemption, given it does not allow comments on videos. But the government has not confirmed this, and YouTube has not commented on whether it would seek an exemption for its service designed for children.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A common misconception about the social media ban is that it will only apply to children. In order to ensure teenagers remain off social media, the platforms will need to check the ages of all user accounts in Australia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n How they will do that is not prescribed, but it will be informed by the outcome of the age assurance technology trial<\/a>, the full report of which is due in August.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The government has legislated that although ID checks can be one form of age assurance, it can\u2019t be the only one accepted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It is expected Australia will follow a similar path for age assurance that launched in the UK<\/a> in July, which includes options such as:<\/p>\n\n\n\n In addition to that, platforms could infer user ages based on account behaviour or age. For example, if you signed up for Facebook in 2009, you would be over 16 by now. YouTube has also flagged<\/a> it will use artificial intelligence to determine user ages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Albanese has compared the social media ban to alcohol restrictions, and said there will no doubt be children who manage to get around the ban, but he argued it was still worth doing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nWhat are the exemptions?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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\n\n\n\nWon\u2019t kids find ways around it?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n