On 10 December, the scrolls stopped as the digital curtain of the Federal Government’s social media ban fell into place.
With the Government’s social media ban officially in place as of 10 December, local youth are quickly adapting their platform usage, albeit not in ways that were expected.
With the purpose of shielding Australia’s youth from social harm and promoting real world experience, the ban was enacted under the Online Safety Amendment (Social Media Minimum Age) Act 2024.
The new legislation maintains that all age-restricted social media platforms must “take reasonable steps to prevent Australians under the age of 16 from creating or keeping an account.”
Social media services are defined as electronic services with the sole or primary purposes of enabling online social interaction between two or more users, and allow users to post material on their service according to the Online Safety Act.
Based on the above definition, platforms that were required to take action to ban users under the age of 16 from their services included Tik Tok, Instagram, Snapchat, X, Youtube, Facebook and Reddit, among other platforms.
Since its recent implementation, the strength of the social media ban itself has been inconsistent, with many youth under the age of 16 retaining access to some or all of the above listed platforms, while others have lost access.
Healesville High School student Paige, 14, is yet to be kicked off any of the social media platforms she uses.
“Most people have found a way around the ban,” Paige said.
“I still have access to all of my social media platforms.”
According to Paige, many of her platforms warned her that a ban was in store but have not taken any action to halt her accounts.
Paige said, “It might be because I have had the apps for a long time.”
“The platforms probably think I am older than I am,” she said.
While some of her friends lost access to Snapchat, Tik Tok and Instagram, Paige noted that there are ways to get around the ban.
“People can just make new accounts,” Paige said.
“A few of my friends have ended up making new Snapchat accounts and I think that is what everyone is doing,” she said.
“Some of my friends already had two accounts, so when they got kicked off one, they just used the other ones.”
Despite retaining access to her social media accounts, Paige notes that there have been some changes in her social media habits due to the absence of some of her friends who were locked out of the platforms.
“My social media use is probably the same, except some of my friends have been kicked off so I am not doing as much on social media because I can’t interact with them on there,” Paige said.
“I am only talking to a couple of friends on Snapchat now,” she said.
Paige noted that more education and social commentary surrounding bullying and online behaviour is needed in accompaniment with the ban.
“People are still bullying other people whether it is online or not,” Paige said.
For 15-year-old Hills High School Student Eliza, the ban was a proposal that she thought was unlikely to be followed through.
“When I first heard about the ban, I thought it wouldn’t actually happen,” Eliza said
“I thought it wasn’t real,” she said.
While Eliza believes the ban is necessary and a good idea, she suggested that the age limit should be lowered to 14.
Eliza also confirmed that her screentime habits have changed since she was banned from Instagram.
“Before the ban, I had a lot of online screentime, like a lot,” Eliza said.
Where Instagram was Eliza’s social media platform of choice, she described being frustrated at being removed from the app.
“I was annoyed about having screen time taken off me,” Eliza said.
“They should have given a warning two hours before, telling me that my account would shut down,” she said.
“For me, it came a day early, so it was a bit of a surprise.”
Despite her initial frustration at the suspension of her account, Eliza noted that it was not long until she was back on the app.
“It banned me and then within two hours, me and my friends found a way to get around it,” she said.
“It wasn’t hard.”
Eliza and her friends created new accounts with older dates of birth. She suspects that these accounts will be shut down in the near future.
Additionally, Eliza confirmed creating her new account did not require any identification, however identification was needed to validate her old account.
Both Paige and Eliza noted that neither of their schools educated their student cohorts on the Social Media ban, its purpose, function and potential effects.
According to a spokesperson from the ESafety Commission, “Australia’s social media minimum age obligations aim to protect young Australians from the pressures and risks associated with holding social media accounts.”
The source told Star Mail that the obligations include “features such as autoplay, endless content and algorithmically recommended content.”
“Such features, along with shortform video content may encourage excessive consumption without breaks and amplify exposure to harmful content,” the source said.
The eSafety Commission encourages users to appeal through the services provided on social media platforms if they believe the platform has made an error.
The recent changes under the recent age-cap legislation equip the eSafety Commission with information-gathering powers to require platforms to provide information relevant to their compliance with the social media minimum age obligation. This may include information about what steps platforms are taking to respond to circumvention.
Despite the ban itself not keeping youth under the age of 16 from social media, in some forms, the legislation is already a success, altering some social media habits and prompting much conversation about platform usage.
While the legislation has changed the screentime behaviours of some young Australians, the fact that many youth under the age of 16 still have access to social media contradicts the rules of the ban where, under Australian law, social media platforms and services must take significant steps to remove those under the age of 16 from their services.
With many Australians under the age of 16 still able to access social media, the eSafety Commission spokesperson said, “eSafety expects platforms to take steps that are evidence-based and responsive to emerging technology and risk.“
“While platforms are not required to eliminate all uncertainty, they should seek to minimise harm and work continuously to improve their age assurance methods. Our regulatory guidance for platforms makes it clear that we expect platforms to actively monitor and respond to changes in circumvention methods,“ they said.
Researchers have begun analysing the effects of the social media ban and will continue to do so in the near future.
