Report Reveals Australian Children Easily Bypass Social Media Age Restrictions

The Australian online safety regulator ESafety shared a report this Thursday revealing that children can easily bypass the age verification systems imposed by social media platforms.

Australia approved a social media ban for children under the age of 16 in November 2024, led by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, forcing tech companies to comply or pay fines of up to $32 million. The ban will take effect by the end of this year, and, since January, social media channels have been in a trial period.

The new report revealed that most platforms relied only on a self-declaration that can be quickly faked and dismissed by children.

“Social media services not only need to make it harder for underage users to sign up to their services in the first place, but also make sure that users who are old enough to be on the service, but are not yet adults, have strong safety measures in place by default,” said eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant.

Researchers interviewed young Austrians across the country, aged from 8 to 15, in 2024, and 80% used one or more social media services, and are likely to continue doing so.

The watchdog considered 8 of the most popular platforms for the research: Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Snap, Twitch, Discord, Reddit, and also YouTube, the only platform approved to show content to children.

Most platforms included simple age requirements to create new accounts—except Reddit—and self-declarations. The report suggests that number of young users reported by the social media companies could be even higher.

ESafety said they are in discussions with stakeholders over the next steps to develop more efficient age verification systems. “This report shows that there will be a tremendous amount of work to be done between now and December,” said Inman Grant.

Australia’s decision to ban social media channels has sparked debate and concerns across the world. While the government suggested to be working on age-verification systems, the companies providing social media services will be the ones responsible for infringing the law.