Australia is leading the charge with a landmark policy change that could lead to the regulation of social media usage among minors, making it illegal. Beginning December 11, 2023, social media companies operating in Australia need to step up. They should be required to take active steps to ensure that users under 16 don’t have access to their platforms. This project is rapidly loading the template for other countries to follow. It’s sparked an angering debate about whether the law is working and what it should mean for user privacy.
The recent findings from the trial indicate that age assurance technology can be practically implemented in Australia. We believe this rollout can take place while preserving user privacy. This has experts worried, because there’s still a lot of work to do before the system can be considered reliable. Professor Tama Leaver, a key figure in this discussion, emphasized the challenges ahead.
“If the rest of the world is watching Australia and hoping that this might be a blueprint, we’re going to have an awful lot of work to do in the next few months to actually have a blueprint to practically do this rather than simply aspire to giving parents some reassurance, which is what ultimately I think this legislation boils down to.” – Professor Tama Leaver
The trial aims to ensure that age verification systems accurately determine whether users are over or under the set threshold of 16 years old. Even with these highly promising initial results, Professor Leaver cautioned that the technology’s efficacy is very much still being tested.
QUT Professor Daniel Angus warned we’re not doing enough to raise public awareness about the negative effects of these kinds of technologies devoted to surveillance. He noted that most people wouldn’t understand what it actually means to exchange sensitive personal information. This is particularly crucial on social media platforms.
“One of the key concerns that we have is how the industry often will inflate their accuracy and the utility of these approaches when we know that there are still significant issues when it comes to both gender and also racial biases, but also the general lack of efficacy of these approaches.” – Professor Daniel Angus
Australia’s success has other countries looking to follow Australia’s lead. Now, New Zealand, Greece, France, and Spain are looking to adopt similar policies. The results of Australia’s pilot can establish a worldwide standard on what age verification looks like in digital environments.
Even with the government’s strong encouragement behind this ban, experts are still skeptical. In fact, Professor Angus was skeptical about the measure’s effectiveness even when it was a joke, saying it was unlikely to get 100% compliance from users. He said that creates a big danger by forcing people to share personal information just to be able to use necessary services.
“The greater risk that comes from when we’re all, and that’s every single person being asked to give over very sensitive personal data to vendors, third parties, perhaps the government just to access basic digital services that we’ve come to rely on every day and what that looks like.” – Professor Angus
Youth Advocate April Willis expressed her concerns regarding the ban’s effectiveness in safeguarding young people’s mental health. She doubts that people won’t just find ways to go around those restrictions anyway, negating the entire purpose of the initiative.
“I think the hard truth is that a lot of us are thinking, ‘I would’ve found a way around it’, as I’m sure many young people will. I most likely would not have listened and yeah, I would’ve joined it somehow some way.” – April Willis
Cyber safety expert Kirra Pendergast supports the ban. She hopes that it will provide parents and educators with an opportunity to have meaningful discussions with children about how to stay safe online. She reiterated the need for equipping youth to safely take on the digital world.
“I think there’s multi-pronged benefits here. It’s going to help the parent that struggles with no say, sorry buddy. You can’t have it until you’re 16. It’s definitely going to help there. It’s also going to spark big conversations. It’s also going to help educators get children ready in time because they’re thrust into a world that they don’t understand.” – Kirra Pendergast
Though many experts support the initiative as a step in the right direction, they concede it is not a silver bullet. Pendergast noted that age verification will not make platforms 100% safe. Still, it is an important first step in jumpstarting wider societal conversations around online safety.
“It’s like all aspects of technical security, cybersecurity, cyber safety. It’s never ever going to be 100%. This is never going to be the silver bullet, but it’s a really, really good start because again, it sparked all of the conversations that we needed to have at every level of society.” – Kirra Pendergast
