A federal plan to ban children under 16 from social media has drawn criticism as the government prepares to roll out world-first online age restrictions later this year.
Communications Minister Anika Wells is meeting this week with major social media giants including Meta, Snapchat, TikTok, and Youtube to outline the government’s expectations ahead of the ban, which will take effect from December 10, 2025.
Digital Rights Watch Head of Policy, Tom Sulston disagreed with the ban and claimed that it will leave children more vulnerable and at risk of abuse.
“We want to see children’s safety on the internet improve, but this bill will make children less safe,” Mr Sulston said.
“Children will be less safe because paedophiles and abusers will simply move to platforms that are not covered by the social media ban. When children are approached inappropriately on social media, they will be less likely to see help because they’re doing something that they shouldn’t be.”
Mr Sulston warned that social media platforms could become more explicit and children will gain access to the content regardless.
“The social media platforms will have an excuse to reduce their content moderation and safety tools. Platforms will become nastier and more dangerous places. And of course, children will still get onto them because age-assurance technologies fundamentally don’t work,” Mr Sulston said.
However, registered psychologist and school counsellor Nese Sozen said the ban could benefit young people’s mental health, as social media can disrupt sleep, increase body image concerns, and encourage unhealthy self-comparisons among developing children.
“Social media affects children’s mental health a lot, because it affects brain wiring by activating the brain’s reward system, leading to a dopamine driven cycle or craving similar to addiction,” Ms Sozen said.
However, Ms Sozen agreed that this new ban would pose challenges.
“This policy raises privacy concerns as age verification methods could lead to the collection of sensitive personal data, which risks breaches,” she said.
Ms Sozen argued that the new policy is only a partial solution and will not work unless everyone gets behind it.
“Government policy being introduced, that’s great, but parents, schools, and government officials have to work collaboratively to achieve the best result,” she said.
The Australian Human Rights Commission has also expressed reservations about the social media ban, with the fear that these proposed laws interfere with the rights of children.
The implementation of this ban will vary across platforms, as the government is not prescribing specific approaches, leaving the next steps in the hands of social media companies.