Australia’s Social Media Age Limit Policy Delays Account Creation, Not Access to Content

The policy has been widely mischaracterized

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Australia is giving a gift to its parents and teens, and the benefits will soon spread globally. Their new Age Limit Policy for Account Creation is the most monumental step yet taken in the international movement to protect kids from the industrial scale harms caused by social media companies. It raises the age — from 13 to 16 — at which children can sign a contract with these companies (the terms of service agreement), giving away their data and exposing themselves to manipulative design. In Australia, beginning this December, you’ll have to be at least 16-years-old to open or maintain a social media account.

This policy has the support of parents in Australia and around the world, and many other countries are already considering following Australia’s lead. It’s popular because most parents don’t want their children using social media, yet many feel that they have no choice: if they hold the line and keep their kids off while everyone else’s kids are on, then their kids will be isolated.

At present, the companies bear no responsibility for age verification, so no matter how hard parents try, if a 10-year-old child can get to a web browser, she can set up as many accounts as she wants simply by saying she is 13. Setting a standard minimum age, as we do for driving, smoking, and gambling, changes the dynamic, removes the social pressure on kids, and puts the responsibility for enforcement where it belongs: on the companies that are profiting by selling children’s attention. It also frees parents from the struggle over social media that has affected so many families.

Yet the policy is often misunderstood and has been widely mischaracterized. We want to correct the record. The policy does not cut young people off from accessing content online. Kids below the age minimum will still have the ability to search for and watch videos, read posts, and access information.

What’s new is that some of the most powerful companies in the world are, for the first time, forbidden from entering into a business relationship with children, a relationship that internal documents show is designed to foster addiction by using children’s personal data to keep them “engaged.”

What Australia’s Age Limit Policy Actually Does

The policy, set to take effect on December 10, 2025, protects kids by 1) mandating a minimum age of 16 for social media account creation and use and 2) requiring the platforms to take “reasonable steps” to enforce the age minimum or face steep penalties. As the Australian online safety regulator explains in its FAQ:

Age-restricted platforms won’t be allowed to let under-16s create or keep an account. That’s because being logged into an account increases the likelihood that they’ll be exposed to pressures and risks that can be hard to deal with. These come from social media platform design features that encourage them to spend more time on screens, while also serving up content that can harm their health and wellbeing.

… Under-16s will still be able to see publicly available social media content that doesn’t require being logged into an account.

The policy will apply to social media platforms that fit the following criteria, according to the eSafety commissioner:

• The sole purpose, or a significant purpose, of the service is to enable online social interaction between two or more end-users.

• The service allows end-users to link to, or interact with, some or all of the other end-users.

• The service allows end-users to post material on the service.

While they haven’t yet published an official list, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, X, and YouTube, among others, will likely be affected. (For more on how Australia defines its inclusion and exclusion criteria, see here)

The FAQ covers topics such as which platforms are likely included or excluded, what the policy does, penalties for companies, advice for parents, and more. Below are three frequently asked questions we believe are especially important to understand. (The text is drawn from the AUS esafety FAQ):

1. Will there be penalties for under-16s if they get around the age restrictions?

There are no penalties for under-16s who access an age-restricted social media platform, or for their parents or carers. This is about protecting young people, not punishing or isolating them. The goal is to help parents and carers support the health and wellbeing of under-16s.

2. What are the penalties for age-restricted platforms that allow under-16s to have accounts?

A court can order civil penalties for platforms that don’t take reasonable steps to prevent underage users from having accounts on their platforms. This includes court-imposed fines of up to 150,000 penalty units for corporations – currently equivalent to a total of $49.5 million AUD.

3. What proof of age methods will be allowed?

There is a range of technologies available to check age, at the point of account sign up and later. It will be up to each platform to decide which methods it uses.

eSafety will publish regulatory guidance to help platforms decide which methods are likely to be effective and comply with the Online Safety Act. The guidelines will draw on the Australian Government’s Age Assurance Technology Trial as well as stakeholder consultations, including our ongoing engagement with social media platforms that are likely to be restricted. The regulatory guidance will also draw on our existing knowledge base, and is likely to include principles that are consistent with similar international frameworks. The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner will provide guidance on privacy.

No Australian will be forced to use government ID (including Digital ID accredited under the Australian Government’s Digital ID System) to prove their age online – age-restricted social media platforms will have to offer reasonable alternatives to users.

[NOTE: The Australian government released an Age Assurance Technical Trial showing that there are many effective ways for age authentication to happen. See the report here.]

What Critics (Erroneously) Say It Does

A common criticism of the policy is that it is a ban so severe that it will block kids from watching videos on YouTube and teachers from using YouTube videos in their classes.

This is false; contrary to their claims, the law does not block kids from accessing content. In the words of the eSafety Commissioner, “It’s not a ban, it’s a delay to having accounts.” Kids can still search for and watch videos, read posts, and access information — as long as the platforms allow access without an account. The benefit to kids comes from ensuring they are not logged into an account, which helps prevent them from falling prey to harmful design practices that are aimed at increasing “engagement” and that leave most kids feeling manipulated.

YouTube, in their criticism of the law, points out that 84% of Australian teachers use its videos in classrooms, but that point is irrelevant. Under the new law, students can still watch those videos without an account — at school or at home. To YouTube’s credit, it allows broad access to content without an account, and other companies could adopt a similar approach.

Some platforms, like Instagram, largely restrict access to users with accounts, and Australian kids under the age of 16 will have limited or no access to content on those platforms. Compare this to the way in which some media publications use paywalls to limit articles to paying customers: this is a business strategy that drives customer acquisition. Social media companies often make a similar business decision, limiting access to users with an account (those who “pay” with their personal data), but they could easily choose to adopt a similar approach to YouTube. The companies have control over what content is accessible to those without an account — this is not decided by the Australian government or the new policy.

Yes, across the board, private content (i.e., content posted by people whose accounts are set to private) will be inaccessible without an account. But with the age restriction, a teen’s friends won’t have accounts either, so there won’t be as much private content to miss. Teens will retain many ways (including via digital devices) to communicate among themselves — just without “innovations” like the gamification of messaging or an endless stream of algorithmically selected content.

What Will Change For Each Platform

The table below illustrates what the policy means for the most popular social media platforms in Australia and most of the Western world:

Teens Understand the Problem

Teens already recognize the manipulative nature of these platforms. The Australian recently interviewed teens about life without social media and found that “Kids born this century are well aware they’re the guinea pigs of a giant psychological and commercial experiment to keep them wired at all times.”

Here is an excerpt from Mila, one teen interviewed in the article, discussing an upcoming phone-free holiday:

“I’m so excited to miss out on seven whole days of social media,” says Mila. “I’m gonna get my life back. I think it’ll make me really happy… I can’t wait to have all this time with my friends I’d usually spend on my phone,”

The sentiments expressed by these teens are widespread. Many share adults’ fears about spending too much time on their phones. Recent polling shows that 48% of Americans ages 13- to 19-years-old believe social media has a “mostly negative” effect on people their age. A recent Harris poll found that nearly half of young adults ages 18 through 27 wish that the platforms they grew up with — Snapchat, TikTok, and X — were never invented.

Bravo, Australia

We wholeheartedly endorse Australia’s groundbreaking effort to better protect kids from being taken advantage of online. Australia’s families and children will be better off because of this policy, and other countries will follow suit.

Australia has bravely been the first, risking criticism and punishment from powerful companies. But if other countries quickly follow, then their collective action will shift the power dynamic. Kids will go back to consuming content because they are actively seeking it out, rather than because an AI powered algorithm has figured out how to push the right notification to them at the right time. They will get countless hours of their childhoods back to sleep, study, or socialize, and we will all be better off for it.

We understand that change is difficult. There will be a transition period where many kids lose access to their accounts, and some accounts may be mistakenly deleted and later restored. It will take time to adjust to this new reality. But as we’ve seen with phone-free schools, kids adapt quickly. Before long, stories emerge of students feeling freer, less distracted, and more present, with more time and energy for the things that matter to them. And yes, implementation will be far from perfect in the initial weeks, but it will get better. Research and innovation will help shape and improve the policy as it goes on.

Even with these challenges, the alternative is far worse. Without action, we leave yet another generation to grow up under the rule of a handful of tech companies whose business models depend on capturing as much of children’s time and attention as possible. We still hope these companies will someday redesign their platforms to make them safe for teens. But they have repeatedly refused to make meaningful changes, even as they know or believe that their products are causing harm to children. So we applaud Australians for taking matters into their own hands to protect their children.

Bravo, Australia, and thank you.