MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — A social media ban for children under 16 passed the Australian Parliament on Friday in a world-first law. The law will make platforms including TikTok, Facebook, Snapchat, Reddit, X and Instagram liable for fines of up to 50 million Australian dollars ($33 million) for systemic failures to prevent children younger than 16 from holding accounts.
The Senate passed the bill on Thursday 34 votes to 19, and the House of Representatives on Wednesday overwhelmingly approved the legislation by 102 votes to 13. The House on Friday endorsed opposition amendments made in the Senate, making the bill law.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the law supported parents concerned by online harms to their children. “Platforms now have a social responsibility to ensure the safety of our kids is a priority for them,” Albanese told reporters.
The platforms have one year to work out how they could implement the ban before penalties are enforced. Meta Platforms, which owns Facebook and Instagram, said the legislation had been “rushed.” Digital Industry Group Inc., an advocate for the platforms in Australia, said questions remain about the law’s impact on children, its technical foundations and scope.
The amendments passed on Friday bolster privacy protections. Platforms would not be allowed to compel users to provide government-issued identity documents including passports or driver’s licenses, nor could they demand digital identification through a government system.
Critics of the legislation fear that banning young children from social media will impact the privacy of all users who must establish they are older than 16. While the major parties support the ban, many child welfare and mental health advocates are concerned about unintended consequences.
Exemptions will apply for health and education services including YouTube, Messenger Kids, WhatsApp, Kids Helpline and Google Classroom. Opposition Sen. Maria Kovacic said the bill was not radical but necessary. “The core focus of this legislation is simple: It demands that social media companies take reasonable steps to identify and remove underage users from their platforms,” Kovacic told the Senate.
Online safety campaigner Sonya Ryan, whose 15-year-old daughter Carly was murdered by a 50-year-old pedophile who pretended to be a teenager online, described the Senate vote as a “monumental moment in protecting our children from horrendous harms online.”
Wayne Holdsworth, whose teenage son Mac took his own life after falling victim to an online sextortion scam, had advocated for the age restriction and took pride in its passage. Christopher Stone, executive director of Suicide Prevention Australia, said the legislation failed to consider positive aspects of social media in supporting young people’s mental health and sense of connection.
The platforms had complained that the law would be unworkable and had urged the Senate to delay the vote until at least June 2025 when a government-commissioned evaluation of age assurance technologies will report on how young children could be excluded.
