The Albanese government's social media ban takes effect on Wednesday

Here's what you need to know.

Starting on the 10th of December, new social media restrictions will prohibit teenagers from accessing social media platforms until they are 16 years old.

The world-first laws require specified ‘age-restricted social media platforms’ to take ‘reasonable steps’ to enforce the ban or else be liable for penalties of up to $50 million.

Approaches will vary between companies, but they are broadly expected to deploy age verification technologies to prevent under-16s from having or creating accounts, while still maintaining their privacy obligations. Most platforms already have ways of ‘inferring’ user’s age via existing account data (such as the content you post and engage with, or your account’s creation date), but the method is not very precise, meaning some users will be required to provide further proof like video selfies, or government-issued ID.

Already, most popular social media platforms officially require users to be at least 13 years old to create an account and use various age verification mechanisms to comply with global online safety regulations.

Photo by Berke Citak on Unsplash

Restricted Platforms

Criteria set out by the Minister for Communications specifies that the ban will apply to all social media platforms that meet the following three conditions:

• The sole purpose, or a significant purpose, of the service is to enable online social interaction between two or more end-users

• The service allows end-users to link to, or interact with, some or all of the other end-users

• The service allows end-users to post material on the service.

Platforms encompassed under this definition include Facebook, Instagram, Kick, Reddit, TikTok, Snapchat, Threads, Twitch, X and YouTube.

Meanwhile, platforms excluded from the ban include messaging apps Messenger and WhatsApp, gaming platforms Discord, Steam, and Roblox, as well as Pinterest and YouTube Kids.

How did we get here?

Social media age restrictions were first floated locally by South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas in May 2025, and quickly gained national momentum.

The same month, a social change campaign called 36 Months was launched, calling on the Federal Government to increase the minimum age of social media users from 13 to 16 years.

Fronted by Nova radio presenter Michael ‘Wippa’ Wipfli and advertising executive Rob Galluzzo, the campaign quickly made it onto the political agenda after Wippa asked Prime Minister Anthony Albanese for his support during an on-air interview.

It coincided with News Corp’s ‘Let Them Be Kids’ campaign, which directed readers to sign a petition calling on the Government to ban social media for under-16s.

Both campaigns appealed to widely-held fears that excessive social media use was “causing an epidemic of mental illness” among teenagers. The argument hinged on a shared duty to protect child safety - they asserted that the government needed to take action against social media companies that were “putting profits before people”. Critics have pointed out the irony of News Corp claiming moral high ground, but it didn’t stop the message from landing.

On 13 November 2024, the Albanese government introduced draft legislation and pushed it through a whirlwind senate inquiry and consultation process.

Just weeks later, the Online Safety Amendment (Social Media Minimum Age) Bill 2024 officially passed through Federal Parliament, and social media platforms were given 12 months notice to develop and roll out systems to enforce age restrictions by 10 December 2025.

Rushed into law?

The most prominent criticism of the incoming social media ban has been the rushed handling of the consultation and inquiry process - particularly when youth and mental health advocates have been routinely reminded that important policy changes ‘take time’.

Stakeholders were only given a 24-hour window to make submissions on the bill, with Australia’s human rights commissioner Lorraine Finlay warning the rushed process left out critical discussions around the rights of children impacted by the ban, and the potential privacy risks of age verification and assurance schemes.

The same month, a Joint Select Committee that had been given more than six months to consider the impact of social media on society declined to back such an age ban in its recommendations.

“It was made abundantly clear through this inquiry that an age ban alone will not make the platforms safer or age appropriate, nor will it change the culture that informs unsafe behaviours that people are targeted with on these platforms, from eating disorders to gambling,” said Greens Senator and deputy chair of the inquiry Sarah Hanson Young in the report’s additional comments. “Rather than banning young people altogether, we need to tackle the predatory business models of the tech giants, including the poisonous algorithms that fuel extremism, mental health problems and division in our democracy.”

High Court Challenge

Last week, the incoming law came face to face with its first legal challenge: 15-year-olds Noah Jones and Macy Neyland filed a constitutional challenge against the ban in the High Court, arguing that the new law breaches the implied freedom of political communication under the Australian Constitution.

The plaintiffs are backed by the Digital Freedom Project, a campaign group led by NSW Libertarian Party MP John Ruddick. It should be no surprise, given the party’s ‘Hands off social media!’ initiative is the major centrepiece of a policy agenda that strongly opposes government interference in the lives of everyday Australians (they are also known for their hard-line stances on issues like Covid-era lockdowns, vaccine mandates, and free speech).

The case puts forward the claim that the law excludes under-16s from the principal online spaces where news is consumed and public debate occurs, and warns that the ban will drive teens to circumvent the law through VPNs and other strategies.

The plaintiffs are seeking an urgent High Court injunction to prevent the government from enforcing the ban come December 10 - though legal experts say these kinds of injunctions are rare.

Without an injunction, the law will take effect as planned, even if the constitutional challenge later succeeds.

The Albanese Government has not directly addressed the case, but has previously asserted that it will not be “intimidated by legal challenges or threats” from technology companies and advocacy groups.

Vulnerable teens left behind

Whether we like it or not, social media has become an integral part of teenagers’ daily lives - for all the negative impacts, it also has important benefits.

Mental health experts, social workers and youth advocates have raised concerns that the social media ban will further isolate the young people who are most vulnerable and at risk - youth who are LGBTQIA+, neurodivergent, those experiencing homelessness, and those who live remotely are all groups who will lose critical connections to community and support online.

The loss of the lifeline provided by social media will likely further entrench disadvantage and mental health conditions for those who do not have access to alternative supports and resources.

There has been strong criticism of the fact that policymakers did not give sufficient weight to the perspectives and experiences of young people who use social media, and would be the most impacted by the ban. The result, according to many, is a short-sighted, knee-jerk reaction that will not solve the fundamental cultural and social harms of the platforms in their current states - harms that impact people of all ages.

Teenagers are already planning ways to circumvent the ban, potentially placing them at risk of even greater harm as they flock to unregulated alternative platforms that sit outside of the ban.

With all of this in mind, experts have instead called for reforms to be focused on improving the social media experience for all people, proposing that social media platforms should be held accountable for the impacts of the content and algorithms that teenagers (and the rest of us) are exposed to.

Proposed alternatives

• Digital duty of care: This concept, which the Albanese government has indicated it supports, would put on all tech platforms a ‘social moral obligation’ to protect their users from harm.

• Regulatory crackdown: By developing stronger regulatory frameworks more broadly, policymakers could force tech companies to maintain high safety standards or face penalties.

• Give users control over their algorithms: Advocacy groups like Teach Us Consent have called for platforms to introduce features that enable users to turn off harmful algorithms so that content in shown in chronological order.

• Invest in media literacy and digital safety programs and resources: Teaching children how to navigate social media safely and improving support could be more effective in mitigating social media addiction and harms than an approach of prohibition.