When Australia launched its ban on social media for children under the age of 16 in December, its global impact remained to be seen. The world watched with keen interest as the country adopted the most far-reaching ban yet, amid a global mix of scepticism, admiration and – among some – a staunch belief that many children would find a way to circumvent it.
Months later, it became clear that Australia’s efforts were the start of a global reckoning; in March, Indonesia began blocking children under the age of 16 from accessing most social media and Malaysia followed suit this month. Last week Britain announced its own ban, which it plans to have in place by early 2027.
Australia’s ban has certainly seemed to spark intrigue among other lawmakers. What exactly will come of all this remains to be seen. “The phrase ‘tech’s “big tobacco” moment’ has been thrown about. It’s certainly the case that there is a more substantial body of evidence now than perhaps ever before about the harms and the addictive qualities of social media. But I would say that science is not entirely settled, we’re still learning.”
From Greece to Gabon, each government effort to constrain social media use by children comes with its own nuances. In Austria, for example, the plan is to restrict access to those under 14 years, while France has set the age at 15. Norway, meanwhile, is looking to widen the age scope of its current ban from children under 13 to those 16 and under.
In countries such as Poland, Denmark and England, the efforts to curb social media use have been paired with prohibitions on smartphones in schools. At times regulators have opted for one over the other, such as in Brazil, where authorities have banned the use of mobile phones in schools by pupils of all ages but allow children under 16 to have social media accounts as long as they are formally linked to a parent or legal guardian’s account.
All of it, however, points to a wider conversation that is being had about technology and its impact on children. “There’s a huge amount of activity right now, contending with this extraordinary amount of technology that’s in children and teens’ lives, at home and at school. And when you step back, I think you see the bigger picture: We don’t know what we’re doing, or what consequences we will face.”
In recent months the risks of a hands-off approach have been exposed by the mounting lawsuits – lodged by school districts, government officials of all levels, and thousands of families around the world – accusing social media platforms of harming children’s mental health, whether through deliberate design choices that can be addicting or a failure to protect children from sexual predators and dangerous content. The companies behind the platforms have disputed the allegations.
A landmark case in California, in which Meta and YouTube were found liable for deliberately designing addictive products that hooked a young user and led to her being harmed, was particularly damning. “How do you make a child never put down the phone? That’s called the engineering of addiction. They engineered it, they put these features on the phones”. All of this has left a deep mark on society. “I think the experience with social media, and to some extent the lag in the appearance of harms and the lack of response, that’s weighing on people as they think of AI.
A handful of courts have sought to also tackle AI, from Britain whose recently announced ban includes plans to enforce a minimum age limit of 18 for romantic chatbots, to Canada where the crackdown on social media includes a requirement for the companies behind AI chatbots to put guardrails in place to lower the risk of them communicating harmful content. Recently Norway said it would impose a near-total ban on the use of generative AI tools in elementary schools and restrict their use among older students.
About two-thirds of young people who had social media accounts before the ban managed to retain access. The concerns were brushed off by UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer as he announced the UK government’s plans for a ban. “They get around other laws, too, but we don’t say: ‘Oh, look, a teenager managed to get a drink somehow, so let’s not bother banning alcohol sales to children. That would be utterly ridiculous, and so I just don’t accept that argument.”
Canada’s efforts to ban social media – introduced earlier this month – includes an exemption for companies that can demonstrate they have policies in place to protect people from harmful content. In Spain, the government said its push for a social media ban would be accompanied by legislation that would make social media executives personally accountable for hate speech on their platforms.