If you live in Australia, you’ve probably heard the headlines about kids being locked out of Instagram, TikTok and Snapchat. Overnight, millions of accounts belonging to under-16s started disappearing, and suddenly parents, teachers and business owners were all asking the same question: “What now?”
It can be hard to cut through the noise. Some people see the ban as a long-overdue safety net for young people. Others worry it goes too far, cutting teenagers off from their friends, their communities and even important support services. Businesses that rely on social media are also wondering how this changes their marketing plans.
In this post, you’ll find a practical walkthrough of what the new rules actually say, why they were introduced, which platforms are affected, and what the likely benefits and challenges look like. We’ll also talk about what it all means if you’re running a brand that depends on social media to reach your audience.
What Exactly is the Social Media Age Ban?
From 10 December 2025, most major social media platforms operating in Australia are required to stop users under 16 from holding accounts. The change comes from the Online Safety Amendment (Social Media Minimum Age) Act 2024, which updates the existing Online Safety Act 2021.
The simplest way to think about it is this:
- The law sets a minimum age of 16 for social media accounts on certain platforms.
- The responsibility sits with the platforms, not with kids or parents. Children and carers are not fined for breaking the rules.
- Platforms that don’t take “reasonable steps” to keep under-16s off their services can face severe penalties of up to around $49.5 million AUD.
The eSafety team has been clear that this is not a blanket ban on the internet for teenagers. Young people can still:
- Use messaging apps that are not classified as “age-restricted social media”
- Access educational tools and online learning platforms
- Browse general websites, streaming platforms and other online services
What the law really does is draw a line around a specific type of service: feed-driven, content-sharing social networks where people can publish, comment, follow and be recommended content at scale.
Why Did Australia Introduce This Ban?
So why take such a bold step, especially as the first country in the world to do it at a national level? There are three main drivers.
Rising concerns about mental health
Over the past decade, parents, schools and health professionals have raised serious concerns about rising anxiety, depression, self-harm and suicidal thoughts among young people. Social media is not the only factor, but it sits at the centre of many conversations about:
- Constant comparison
- Cyberbullying and pile-ons
- Exposure to harmful or adult content
- Endless scrolling that cuts into sleep and study time
For many families, it feels like a fight they’re losing at home and in the classroom. The ban is the government’s attempt to shift more responsibility back onto the tech companies that design and run these platforms.
Public campaigns and political pressure
The “Let Them Be Kids” campaign, supported by News Corp Australia, gave these concerns a very public voice. The campaign shared stories from parents who linked their children’s deaths by suicide to online bullying and harassment, and pushed hard for a national minimum age of 16. More than 50,000 people signed the petition supporting the change.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese backed the idea, describing social media as a “scourge” in some contexts and arguing that he would rather see children out on the sports field than glued to their phones. That combination of public emotion and political will helped move the legislation through parliament.
A “first mover” approach
Australia has a history of pushing early on online safety regulation. By setting a clear national rule and giving the eSafety Commissioner enforcement powers, the government is effectively saying to global tech companies: “If you want to operate here, you need to design with children’s safety in mind.”
Other countries, including New Zealand and several in Europe, are now watching closely and considering similar frameworks of their own.
Which Platforms Are Covered – and Which Are Not?
The law applies to a defined list of “age-restricted social media platforms”. As of the start of 2026, this list includes:
- Threads
- TikTok
- Snapchat
- X (formerly Twitter)
- YouTube
- Twitch
- Kick
These are the big, general-purpose social networks most teenagers use to share content, follow creators and interact with large audiences.
The list is not fixed forever. The eSafety Commissioner can add new platforms or remove existing ones as the digital landscape changes. That flexibility is meant to stop companies simply launching “new” apps that dodge the rules in name only.
Certain services are specifically excluded, including:
- Messaging apps such as WhatsApp and Messenger
- Educational tools such as Google Classroom
- YouTube Kids and other child-focused services
- Professional networking and online learning platforms
Under-16s can still use those tools, because they are primarily about communication, education or work, rather than open social networking and public content feeds.
Potential Benefits of the Ban
Like any major policy change, the under-16 ban comes with both potential advantages and real challenges. Let’s start with where it may help.
Reducing exposure to cyberbullying and harmful content
Social media can amplify conflict and cruelty very quickly. A single nasty comment can turn into a pile-on involving dozens of classmates or strangers in a matter of minutes. By limiting access to these environments for younger teens, the law aims to reduce the opportunities for those situations to occur in the first place.
Easing social pressure on pre-teens
Many parents of 10-13-year-olds will recognise the plea: “Everyone in my class is on Instagram/TikTok except me.” When there’s a national rule, it becomes easier for families to hold the line together.
Instead of one household being “too strict”, the expectation shifts: “You get social media when you’re 16; that’s how it works in Australia now.” That can relieve some tension at home and reduce the sense of missing out among kids who are not yet ready to navigate social media safely.
Allowing time for skills and resilience to grow
The goal is not to keep young people offline forever. It’s to give them a few more years to build:
- Basic digital literacy
- Emotional resilience and coping strategies
- A sense of identity that isn’t entirely shaped by likes, views and follower counts
Ideally, a 16-year-old opening their first social media account has a stronger understanding of how algorithms, influencers and targeted ads work than a 12-year-old scrolling purely for entertainment.
Pushing platforms to take child safety seriously
The fines attached to the law are large enough that they get board-level attention. Since the rules were announced, you’ve already seen platforms:
- Introduce stricter sign-up flows for Australian users
- Work with age-assurance providers to estimate users’ ages
- Publicly report the number of suspected under-age accounts they’ve removed (in the millions)
Whether or not you agree with the ban itself, this pressure is forcing design teams to think harder about safety, not just engagement.
Concerns and Open Questions
Supporters see the ban as a strong step toward protecting children. Critics, however, warn about several unintended consequences.
- Privacy and data risks: Many age-verification systems rely on identity documents, facial scans or detailed behavioural profiling. That means more sensitive data in more databases, with all the usual risks of breaches, misuse or function creep.
- Loss of positive online spaces: For some young people, particularly those in regional areas or those who feel isolated at home or school, online communities can be a crucial source of support. Cutting off access to mainstream platforms may also cut off those lifelines.
- Workarounds and “shadow” accounts: Early reports suggest that some teenagers have already bypassed facial-age checks or created accounts under borrowed identities. That can make their online activity harder for adults to see and support.
In other words, the ban aims to solve real problems, but it doesn’t remove the need for ongoing digital education, honest conversations at home, and careful monitoring of how the law plays out in practice.
How Will the Ban Be Enforced in Practice?
Age verification on the internet has always been tricky. The new rules don’t prescribe one single method, but they do require platforms to show they’re making genuine efforts.
In reality, that’s likely to mean a mix of:
- ID checks: Asking users to upload a driver’s licence, passport or other official document to confirm their age
- Facial age-estimation: Using live video selfies and AI models to estimate whether someone appears to be over or under a certain age
- Account and behaviour signals: Looking at how long an account has existed, how it’s used, and other signals that suggest whether it belongs to an adult or a child
- Ongoing audits and reporting: Sharing data with regulators on how many suspected under-age accounts have been blocked or removed
None of these tools are perfect. Some young people have already described simple tricks to fool facial-estimation systems, and VPNs can still be used to disguise location, even though platforms are expected to try to spot those workarounds.
The reality is that enforcement will likely be uneven at first. Large platforms with more resources may move faster than smaller ones, and regulators will need time to refine what “reasonable steps” actually look like in practice.
What Does This Mean for Parents, Schools and Businesses?
For families and educators, the ban is a prompt to revisit how you talk about technology with young people. Rules imposed from Canberra will only go so far without open conversations at home and in the classroom about:
- Why the rules exist
- What healthy online behaviour looks like
- Where young people can go for support if something goes wrong
For businesses, especially those active on social channels, the implications are different but just as real. Engagement rates may change as the under-16 audience drops away. At the same time, there may be stronger expectations from regulators and the public around how you target and speak to younger users.
That’s where a data-driven approach helps: looking at how your audience mix changes over time, which channels still perform well, and where you may be over-exposed to regulatory risk.
How a Digital Partner Can Help You Adapt
You don’t need to become a policy expert overnight to respond sensibly to the under-16 ban. But you do need to understand how it interacts with your existing marketing, particularly if social media is a major channel for you.
This is where working with a digital marketing agency in Sydney that understands both the legal landscape and day-to-day campaign management can make a real difference.
For example, digital agencies like Netplanet Digital has been helping clients:
- Map out which parts of their audience are most affected by the age restrictions
- Update messaging and content to speak more clearly to parents, carers and over-16s
- Diversify their mix across SEO, paid search, email and social so they’re not overly dependent on a single platform or demographic segment
Because digital agencies are deeply involved in Australian online campaigns every day, the team is well placed to interpret guidance from regulators, track changes coming from platforms, and translate all of that into practical steps you can take – without losing sight of your commercial goals.
If you’re looking at the under-16 social media ban and wondering what it means for your brand, you don’t have to figure it out alone. Partnering with an experienced agency that already lives and breathes this space can help you protect young people, stay on the right side of the rules, and keep your marketing working in a fast-changing digital world.
