UK mimics Australia with social media ban for under-16s

The British government has become the latest to copy Australia’s social media ban, saying it is going further than Canberra’s efforts to protect children online.

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced the ban on a range of social media apps today, joining a growing global movement to tighten online safety.

Australia, Canada, Brazil and Indonesia have introduced legislation or announced age-based restrictions or requirements for children’s access to social media, while France, Spain, Denmark, Thailand, South Korea and others are studying or developing similar measures.

Starmer called the ban a “a big moment for our country”, declaring he was “not prepared to compromise on the safety and happiness of our children”.

He said the UK’s ban went further than Australia’s, which bars under-16s from holding social media accounts and allows for multimillion-dollar fines for tech firms if they don’t remove them.

“I’ve heard first hand from families crying out for change and we will do right by them,” he said.

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“That’s why we’re going further than any country in the world by banning social media for under-16s and putting wider protections in place to give kids their childhood back. 

“This is a line in the sand. Tech giants had their chance and failed, but we’re stepping in to protect children, back parents and set a new normal for future generations.”

Like Australia’s, the UK plan will block Snapchat, TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook and X while exempting messaging apps such as WhatsApp and Signal.

But it will also ban livestreaming and communication with strangers for children under 16, while investigating overnight curfews and breaks in infinite scrolling for under-18s.

Chatbots designed to simulate sexual relationships or role play, along with those functions inside more general-purpose chatbots, will be made over-18 only.

While the Albanese government’s bold push for a ban was widely hailed by parents and several international governments as a positive step, many teens and experts have labelled it ineffective.

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eSafety commissioner was 'not really keen' on social media ban

About 70 per cent of Aussie teens who had social media before the ban was enforced still have access, according to an eSafety report, and the watchdog reported no discernible drop in reports of online harm like cyberbullying and image-based abuse from under-16s.

More than 60 per cent of nine.com.au readers called the ban ineffective in an exclusive survey.

About 70 per cent of teens said they backed the ban when it was introduced and fewer than 10 per cent changed their minds in the time since.

The UK government said it would “learn the lessons from Australia’s experience”, making it “harder for children to bypass safeguards” by introducing “more highly effective age assurance measures to support compliance”.

It didn’t detail those measures.

Australian eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant said in May that progress was being made but it took time to undo more than 20 years of social media entrenchment.

eSafety is investigating potential non-compliance by five age-restricted platforms – Snap, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube – and aims to decide any enforcement action soon. 

The decision follows a public comment period in which the government got 116,000 responses from parents, the tech industry and children.

The number of responses was second only to one seeking input about same-sex marriage in 2012 and more than 90 per cent wanted an under-16 ban, the government said.

Esther Ghey, whose 16-year-old daughter Brianna was killed in 2023 by two teenagers who had accessed harmful content online, said the ban would “potentially save so many children’s lives” but had to be accompanied by other measures.

Starmer said the government was “confident that this ban can be effective” despite scepticism from some children’s advocates.

- Reported with Associated Press