The questions of the “lock” of social networks for those under 16 years of age in Australia

The “lock” of social networks for those under 16 years of age is definitive in Australia. The Australian Senate yesterday approved a pioneering law in the world that will prohibit the access of minors under 16 years of age to 2.0 platforms to protect them from the multiple dangers that potentially await them there.

The norm received the green light yesterday in the Australian Senate, where it had the support of the two main parties of the oceanic country after Parliament also gave its approval to the law just a day before.

“It’s about protecting the youngest, not punishing or isolating them”said yesterday Michelle Rowland, Australia’s Minister of Communications. According to Rowland, the last objective of the law approved yesterday by the Senate (which is the first of its kind in the world) is to prevent the exposure of minors on social networks to content directly related to drug abuse, disorders food or violence.

The legislation has strong public support from Australian citizens and some parent groups and associations have encouraged the processing and subsequent approval of the standard. However, the law will probably be confronted with obstacles by the large technological giants, which are logically opposed to the new norm. Even so, it is not just Meta or TikTok that are suspicious of the legislation approved yesterday by Australia’s upper house. Associations in favor of human rights and social media experts have also spoken unfavorably about the new norm.

Critics of the law believe that there are still many questions to be resolved about how compliance with the law will be guaranteed.about how user privacy will be protected and whether the legislation will truly protect minors.

What the new standard says

For now, the rule requires social networks to take “reasonable measures” to verify the age of users who enter their domains. and veto access to minors under 16 years of age who try to open an account there.

The legislation ratified yesterday in the Australian Senate does not clarify which platforms the veto will specifically affect (this will be decided a posteriori), but the Government has already referred to social networks as Facebook, Snapchat, Reddit, Instagram y X as platforms likely to be included in the ban.

Yes, three different types of platforms will overcome the veto: messaging apps (WhatsApp and Messenger Kids, for example), gaming platforms and channels that provide their users with content of an educational nature (YouTube, for example).

Minors under 16 years of age may also access those platforms that allow their users to view content without having to register or create an account. (as is the case with TikTok, Facebook and Reddit).

Rowland considers that the restriction provided for by the rule (which affects the creation of accounts or not the viewing of specific content) is intended mitigate the damages directly related to the constant presence of the minors in the network of networks. This is the case of “persistent notifications and alerts” that affect the sleep of the youngest and their ability to concentrate.

Those who support the rule believe that delaying the exposure of children and adolescents to the pressures they must potentially deal with on social media will allow them more time to develop a “more secure identity” and simultaneously relieve pressure on parents and police to monitor minors’ online activity.

Social media experts and also some parent groups complain, however, that it is not sufficiently clear what exactly the new rule is intended to protect minors from.

Lisa Given, professor of Information Sciences at RMIT University in Melbourne, believes, for example, that it would be more appropriate to address the problem by requiring social networks to introducing measures to improve content moderation on their domains and also more efficiently remove potentially harmful content.

The new law “does not protect children from the potential risks of social networks”stresses Given in statements to The New York Times. And “it could, in fact, create additional problems, excluding younger people from accessing potentially useful information and also raising a whole plethora of privacy issues for all Australians,” adds Given.

How will the new legislation be applied?

If we stop at the question (by no means trivial) of how the new law will be applied, there are many questions and few certainties. Although the standard requires 2.0 platforms to take reasonable measures to verify the age of their users, it leaves these types of channels carte blanche when deciding how to undertake this verification task. Those platforms that do not comply with the new rule will risk, however, being confronted with fines of up to 49.5 million Australian dollars (around 30 million euros).

On the other hand, and in response to the privacy problems raised by the new standard, This specifies that the provision of an identification document issued by the Government cannot be the only option that social networks give users when verifying their age.

The standard mentions alternative methods to verify the user’s age. technologies for this to check the user’s age (the use of facial scanners, for example) or the analysis of the user’s online behavior to estimate their real age.

Some of these alternative methods are already being put into practice by 2.0 platforms. Facebook is relying, for example, on AI to appropriately estimate the age of its users by leveraging details such as the birthday messages they receive on social networks.

The Australian Executive is carrying out its own tests with this type of technology to then inform social networks of the most reasonable measures to take in order to verify the age of users. However, there are those who are critical of these types of tests, many of which anchor themselves in AI and are not 100% infallible in this sense.

The pros and cons of the law

The surveys suggest in any case that most Australian citizens support the lawwhich also has widespread support from parent associations (although some would like the standard to go further and cover more platforms).

Parents whose children have lost their lives as a result of exposure to potentially harmful content on social media have also campaigned for the new rule.

For their part, the companies behind the large 2.0 platforms have not been slow to launch darts against the new norm. Elon Musk, owner of X, has referred, for example, to the law as “a way to control internet access for all Australians through the back door.”

Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, considers that the law “unfortunately overlooks the practical reality of the technology to verify the user’s age on the network of networks.” and also the opinions of most organizations that look after the mental health and safety of young people in Australia.

Other critical voices (that of the independent parliamentarian Zoe Daniel, for example) also assure that The real objective of the rule is not to make social networks safer, but simply to make voters feel that the Government is doing something in this regard.