Australian lawmakers on Thursday passed landmark rules banning people under 16 from using social media, approving one of the world’s toughest crackdowns on popular sites like Facebook, Instagram and Xx.
The bill has now passed both parliamentary chambers with bipartisan support, and social media firms will soon be expected to take “appropriate steps” to prevent young teens from having accounts.
Companies, which face fines of up to 50 million Australian dollars (US$32.5 million) if they fail to comply, have described the laws as “vague”, “problematic” and “rushed through”.
The law was passed by the lower house of Parliament on Wednesday and passed by the Senate late Thursday evening. Now it is almost certain that it will become a law.
Centre-left Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, who is eyeing an election early next year, has enthusiastically backed the new rules and rallied Australian parents to support it.
Before the vote, he characterized social media as “a platform for peer pressure, a driver of anxiety, a vehicle for scammers and, worst of all, a tool for online predators”.
He wanted, he said, young Australians to “get off their phones and go to the football and cricket fields, the tennis and netball courts, the swimming pools”.
– ‘I’ll find a way’ –
But young Australians like 12-year-old Angus Leedom are not impressed.
“I would like to keep using it. And it would be a strange feeling not to have it and be able to talk to all my friends at home,” he told AFP.
It is likely that many people will try to find a way to avoid this.
“I’ll find a way. And so will all my other friends,” Lidom said.
Similarly, Elsie Arcinstall, 11, said there is still a place for social media, especially for kids who want to watch tutorials about baking or art, many of which appear on social media.
“Children and teens need to be able to explore those technologies because you can’t learn all those things from books,” he said.
On paper, the ban is one of the toughest in the world.
But the current law provides almost no detail about how the rules will be enforced – leading to concerns among experts that it will simply be a symbolic piece of legislation that is unenforceable.
It will take at least 12 months for regulators to work out the details and for the ban to come into effect.
Some companies will likely be exempted, such as WhatsApp and YouTube, which teens may use for entertainment, school work or other reasons.
Late amendments were introduced to ensure that government-issued digital IDs could not be used as a means of age verification.
-Australia is at the forefront –
Social media expert Susan Grantham told AFP that digital literacy programs that teach children to think “critically” about what they see online should be adopted, similar to the model used in Finland.
This law will be closely watched by other countries, and many will consider whether to enact similar restrictions.
Lawmakers from Spain to Florida have proposed banning social media for young teens, though no measures have yet been implemented.
China has restricted access for minors since 2021, with people under 14 not allowed to spend more than 40 minutes a day on Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok.
Online gaming time for children is also limited in China.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
