Major online platforms Facebook and Instagram have not finalised a compliance approach to Australia’s under-16s social media ban, while Snapchat is still seeking an exemption, a month and a half out from enforcement.
The platforms warned about the rushed preparations to meet the world-first ban and unintended consequences like data breaches and pushing young users to “darker corners of the internet” at a Senate inquiry on Tuesday.
The public display followed private meetings with Communications minister Anika Wells earlier this month where Snapchat unsuccessfully pushed for an eleventh-hour exemption.
SnapChat, along with Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, X and YouTube are all expected to be captured by the ban, requiring them to take “reasonable steps” to stop Australian users under 16 from holding an account or face fines up to $50 million.
According to the government, around 2.5 million 10- to 15-year-olds should have accounts disabled and locked or deleted from December 10.
While an exemption was given to platforms that primarily enable messaging or gaming, it was not given to Snapchat, which says the new law is being applied unevenly.
“Over 75 per cent of the time on Snapchat spent in Australia is messaging and calling, the same functions used on services like WhatsApp, Messenger and iMessage, all of which have been excluded from these restrictions,” Snap Inc’s SVP of global policy and platform operations Jennifer Stout told the Senate on Tuesday.
Snapchat has been preliminarily assessed as needing to comply with the ban, accepts this and is working towards compliance, with around 440,000 known under-16 users, Ms Stout said.
Meta regional director of policy Mia Garlick said ensuring the company’s Facebook and Instagram platforms comply with the social media ban will be an “enormous challenge” technologically and the company is “working through” its approach to compliance.
The tech giant will need to deactivate or delete the accounts of hundreds of thousands – potentially millions — of Australian users under the age of 16 on December 10.
Meta argues the 16-year-old cut off presents challenges for age assurance techniques that have traditionally focused on identifying 18-year-olds and that device makers and app stores are better placed to
The company’s platforms will use a “waterfall approach” to try and assure ages with less privacy intrusive tools up to higher risk tools lie verifying identity documents, in line with guidance from the regulator.
But Ms Garlick could not provide details on how this will happen or exactly how many users will be impacted.
“We’re still working through the precise… machinations of that,” she told the Senate.
Greens Senator and the party’s digital rights and IT spokesperson David Shoebridge said it was “astounding” that the platforms are still needing to work through information flows for 2.5 million young users weeks out from the deadline.
TikTok public policy lead Ella Woods-Joyce agreed it was a tight timeline for a novel intervention.
“I think the government itself has also said they’re building the plane as they’re flying it, for lack of a better term. We are working very hard to make sure we comply, but.. this is novel legislation,” she said.
Ms Woods-Joyce said the company supports evidence based “sensible legislation” that improves online safety.
“However, experts believe a ban will push younger people into darker corners of the internet where rules, safety tools and protections don’t exist.”
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