16 year old children will not be able to use social media in Australia

Australia is going to become a country in the world where children below 16 years of age will no longer be able to use social media. Now, due to age restrictions on these children, many social media sites including Instagram and Facebook have been banned in the country. According to Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) data for June 2021, about 4.04 million people in Australia were under the age of 16. This group is about 16% of the total population. Due to this, about 40 lakh social media accounts will now be banned.

This ban will come into effect from December 10. With this, Australia will become the first country in the world where the use of social media on teens is banned. TikTok, Snapchat and Meta’s Facebook, Instagram and threads will be banned for people under 16.

accounts will be deactivated

Preparations are being intensified to implement this ban. Facebook, Instagram and Threads on TikTok, Snapchat and Meta will deactivate users under 16 years of age. The online platform will send messages to Australian teens through more than one million accounts in the coming days, giving them the option. Download data, freeze profiles, or lose it all.

After this ban, the remaining 20 million social media users of Australia will remain on social media. Which is about four-fifths of the population.

Why did the government ban

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said that this ban has been imposed so that the digital world does not harm the mental health or development of children. Under the Online Safety Amendment (Social Media Minimum Age) Bill 2024, minors will be prohibited from creating or maintaining accounts on major social media platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, YouTube, X (formerly Twitter), Reddit, Threads and Kik. This will come into effect from December 10, 2025.

The company is busy in following the law

TikTok, which says it has about 200,000 Australian users aged 13-15, told Parliament it is designing a button to report suspected underage users. Besides, other apps are also designing many things to detect the edge. Some apps will estimate age on the basis of selfie.