Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said on Thursday the government will pass a law to ban social media for children under the age of 16, a policy the government says is the best in the world.
“Social media is harming our children and I'm calling time on it,” Albanese said at a press conference.
The law will be presented to the parliament this year, these laws will come into force after 12 months of being accepted by the whites, he added.
There will be no exemptions for users with parental consent.
“The work will be on social media to show that they are taking appropriate measures to prevent access,” said Albanese. “The burden will not be on parents or young people.”
Get daily world news
Get the day's top news, politics, economics, and current affairs, delivered to your inbox once a day.
Communications Minister Michelle Rowland said platforms affected would include Meta Platforms' META.O Instagram and Facebook, as well as Bytedance's TikTok and X. Alphabet's GOOGL.O YouTube may also fall under the law, he added.
All four affected companies could not be reached for comment.
Several countries have vowed to outlaw children's use of social media, although Australia's policy is one of the strictest.
France last year proposed a ban on social media for those under the age of 15, although users have been able to avoid the ban with parental consent.
The United States has for decades required technology companies to seek parental consent to access the data of children under the age of 13, leading most social networks to block those under that age from accessing their services.
-Reporting by Alasdair Pal in Sydney; Edited by Chris Reese and Sandra Maler
