October 5, 2025 • 20 mins
From December 10, kids under 16 will no longer be allowed to hold social media accounts in Australia. It’s a world-first move that has parents divided, teens anxious, and platforms on edge. In this episode, we break down what the ban reallymeans for your family, how it will actually be enforced, and why it might be the biggest parenting shift of the decade.
KEY POINTS:
- What the new minimum age legislation actually does (and doesn’t do)
- How platforms like TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, and Snapchat will change for under-16s
- Why the responsibility sits with tech giants—not parents or kids
- The staggering fines for platforms that fail to comply
- Why strong parental vigilance is still essential, even with new safeguards
- How families can prepare for the “cold turkey” social media cut-off
QUOTE OF THE EPISODE:
“Legislation can move the needle, but it won’t change everything. That’s up to us as parents.”
RESOURCES MENTIONED:
- eSafety Commissioner’s FAQs on the new legislation
- The Screen Smart Series [2 x webinars]
ACTION STEPS FOR PARENTS:
- Start conversations now—help your kids understand what’s coming.
- Plan alternatives for staying connected with friends offline.
- Revisit your family’s screen rules—this is the perfect reset moment.
- Stay vigilant: legislation is a tool, not a replacement for parenting.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hello, this is the Happy Families Podcast. Minimum age legislation
is creeping up. It's only a couple of months away now.
December tenth is when the Federal Government's Social Media minimum
age legislation kicks off. In a lot of ways, this
is first of its kind across the globe and there
are a lot of people who are watching with interest.
(00:27):
Today on the Happy Families Podcast, we unpack what it means,
what people misunderstand, and a whole lot more about how
this thing is actually going to work. The clock's ticking
and we're going to tell you all about it right
after this. Stay with us. Hello, Welcome to the Happy
Families Podcast. It's real parenting solutions every single day on
(00:49):
Australia's most downloaded parenting podcast. We love that you choose
to listen to us. Hopefully you've had a great school holidays.
A couple of states still going through their holidays, but
here in Queensland where we live, it's back to school
and we're kicking off the term with a conversation that
is on a lot of people's minds. The Social Media
Minimum Age Legislation. Term four is the last term of
(01:09):
school where kids under sixteen get access to social media.
It's all about to change.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Tilly died at just fifteen today. Her mom took her
story from regional New South Wales to the world, speaking
at the United Nations. Exhausted and broken, she just couldn't
fight anymore, and social media played a direct role in
(01:36):
her death.
Speaker 3 (01:37):
Well, I've got a whole heap of questions for you today, Okay,
I'd really love to unpack this because I think that
there's plenty of parents who either don't understand the policy
and what's going to change for them and their children,
or kind of misunderstand what the purpose of it is.
So my first question for you is what does this
(01:59):
policy actually do.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
So the policy is designed literally to limit access to
social media platforms to children under the age of sixteen.
That's it in a nutshell. It's pretty widely misunderstood. It's
been very much mischaracterized around the world. But if I
was to read this directly from the E Safety Commissioner's
(02:24):
FAQ about it, it says this age restricted platforms won't
be allowed to let under sixteens create or keep an account,
and that's because being logged into an account increases the
likelihood that they're going to be exposed to pressures and
risks that can be hard to deal with. These come
from social media platform design features that encourage them to
spend more time on screens while also serving up content
(02:46):
that can harm their health and well being. Under sixteens
and this is critical will still be able to see
publicly available social media content that doesn't require being logged
into an account to view. Okay, So that's what it does.
It keeps kids from having an account, It keeps kids
from getting access to anything that's locked down behind an account.
(03:08):
But if there is content on social media platforms that
is available for public viewing, children and teachers and whoever
else will be able to access that content and it
will be able to be viewed.
Speaker 3 (03:19):
So you're suggesting that you don't need to have a
profile to be able to access publicly available content.
Speaker 1 (03:27):
Yeah, exactly, even now as an adult. So I believe
that you don't have a TikTok account, right, yep, But
you can still jump online and look for short videos
and TikTok content will come up in your online search.
You don't have to have an account to be able
to see the content. So the social media minimum age
legislation once more does not stop kids from viewing content
(03:50):
on social media. They can see publicly available social media
content so long as it doesn't require being logged into
an account. If people have privacy settings on, you have
to have an account to be able to get in
there and be friends with them whatever. But they will
not be able to keep an account, create an account,
and therefore have the algorithm doing what algorithms do, which
(04:12):
serves up increasingly half for material and provides ongoingly compelling
content to keep them there longer.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
So it seems like a really lofty goal on the
government's part to I guess rain in some control over
what has been just openly available to these kids.
Speaker 1 (04:32):
Yeah, I mean social media has been the wild wildwist
it still is.
Speaker 3 (04:36):
How are they going to monitor it? Like, how do
they know that this child is sixteen or We've seen
so many times that kids are pretty clever and they
know how to get their way around all these different
controls and platforms, So how do they monitor it?
Speaker 1 (04:54):
So I'm going to be talking with Julie Inman Grant,
the e Safety Commissioner, in a couple of weeks and
ask a little bit more about this. The details on
this are a little bit skinny, but basically, again from
the FAQ on the E Safety Commission's website, there is
a range of technologies available to check age at the
point of account sign up and later on as well.
It's going to be up to each platform to decide
(05:15):
which method they choose to use, and E Safety is
going to publish regulatory guidance to help platforms to decide
which methods are going to be most effective and comply
with the Online Safety Act. The guidelines as well are
going to draw on the Australian Government's Age Assurance Technology
trial as well as a whole lot of stakeholder consultations,
and essentially, no Australian is going to be forced to
(05:37):
use government ID to prove their age online. The age
restricted social media platforms have to offer reasonable alternatives to users,
but basically this is going to be on the platforms
to make sure that all users are over the age
of sixteen.
Speaker 3 (05:54):
So I find this part curious then, because we've done
so many podcasts we've actually acknowledged that these platforms do
not have our children's best interests at heart, correct, and
yet all of a sudden we're actually putting the onus
back on them to take care of our kids.
Speaker 1 (06:09):
Yeah, and that's because too many parents either won't do
it or be want to be their kids' best friends,
so they actively assist them to be online or see,
it's just too hard, like parents are just what they're trying.
They're trying, they're trying, and the kids find ways around it.
So now the focus is very much on what the
platforms are going to do to keep kids off.
Speaker 3 (06:28):
So who gets in trouble if someone falls through the cracks?
Is it the platform or is it parents and kids?
Speaker 1 (06:33):
Okay, So again, if we have a look at the
FAQ on the E Safety website, it says this there
are no penalties for under sixteens who access an age
restricted social media platform. There are no penalties for their
parents or cares. This is about protecting young people, not
punishing or isolating them. The goal is to help parents
and cares support their health and well being of under sixteens.
The penalties therefore go to the platforms. A court can
(06:57):
order civil penalties for platforms that don't take reasonable steps
to prevent underage users from having accounts on their platforms.
This includes court imposed fines of up to a total
of forty nine point five million Australian dollars. That is,
for each case brought against Meta or against TikTok, or
(07:20):
against Snap or against a YouTube. For each case where
it can be proved that they have not taken reasonable
steps to prevent an under sixteen accessing their platform, they
can be fined up to forty nine point five million dollars.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
I know you and a handful of your colleagues worked
really hard to get this legislation in place, and I
know that it means a lot to you, But I
am curious. Do you really think that this is going
to move the needle at all for our kids?
Speaker 1 (07:58):
Yeah? I mean it will. It's not going to change everything.
They've still got access to gaming. There's still work to
be done in terms of access to explicit content. They
will still be able to be on the platforms in
one form or another, in that the platforms can continue
to serve up content in the public domain, and kids
and screens are inextricably linked. But I think it is
(08:18):
going to soften the impact of the platforms. I think
the platforms for under sixteens are going to become less engaging,
and that's because the algorithm no longer knows who they are.
They can't log in unless they're using their parents accounts,
and I don't know too many parents that are going
to be like, of course, you can have my social
media account. Here's the thing I reckon. There's going to
(08:39):
be some parents who are going to sign up for
like a second account and just let the kids use
that one. You can be me. But the algorithm, apparently
this is hearsay. We'll be able to tell whether it's
a teenager using the account or not, and hopefully that
will flag it and be like, Okay, a parent has
signed up for this pretended it's them, but it's actually
the child. I have a sense that the technology company
(09:02):
is going to be able to figure out who's using it,
and forty nine point five million dollar fines are not
attractive to companies like this. This should work. Let me
also highlight there is enormous support among parents and even
surprisingly some growing support among young people for this ban
(09:23):
for this minimum age legislation. Ahead of the implementation, YouGov
did a survey and found that seventy seven percent of
Australians back the under sixteen social media minimum age legislation.
That's up from sixty one percent just a few months earlier,
there's only twenty three percent that opposed the measure. In addition,
(09:45):
eighty seven percent of Austrains support the introduction of stronger
penalties for social media companies that are doing this. The
polls are showing really strong support across all aspects of
the government's proposed social media regulations.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
So I feel like there are going to be so
many found is that are going to be breathing a
sigh of relief that finally they have a village that's
actually starting to recognize the damage that this is doing
to individuals and family units. But I'm also concerned that
in doing so, parents become less vigilant. And I think
(10:22):
that this actually would suggest that more than ever, as parents,
we actually need to band together and we need to
be more vigilant than we've ever been because we've now
been given this safeguard. It's in place, and if we
can honor that safeguard and work together as communities to
continue to safeguard our children in more profoundly impactful ways,
(10:47):
that's when the needle shifts, not because the government's put
in this policy.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
Yeah, so nature will fill a vacuum, and if the
kids aren't able to do X, y Z, they'll find
something else to do there. And so it's going to
be up to us to make sure that we're delaying
access to screen, having conversations with kids about what they're
doing on screens, and giving them in riching environments where
they can go and be creative, come up with other ideas,
do other things that are going to be far more
in their best interests. If we just think, oh, well,
(11:12):
the government's done it now we don't have to do anything,
then we're selling our children short. And we're also we
have far too much belief in the power of legislation.
It can move the needle, but it's not going to
change everything.
Speaker 3 (11:23):
I was actually speaking with a young man recently about
his real fears that this is just another ploy from
the government to take control of us. They want they
want they want our id they want to you know,
they want to know everything about us, and that we're
heading towards a dictatorship because we no longer have the
choice to decide whether or not we will have an account.
Speaker 1 (11:46):
How do you allay those fears?
Speaker 3 (11:48):
Because for him it was real, like it was intensely
real for him.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
So a couple of things. First, of all, young men
and young women who are getting all of their news
from influencers who are spreading fear and panic are just
going to end up with anxiety and be miserable about it.
Number two, you don't have to have an account if
you don't want to, so nobody's getting your details if
you're not putting your details up there. If you do
want to have an account, guess what. Alphabet is the
parent company of Google, who also owns YouTube and Meta.
(12:12):
They know more about you than you know about you,
and they like, if you're worried about the government knowing
about you, I'd be just as concerned, if not more concerned,
about what these corporations know. And they know everything. And
by the way, the government knows everything about you as well.
They know where you live. They've got all of your
ID already because of things like driver's licenses and passports
and because of spending habits. The ATO does actually talk
to the banks and gets all the information about where
(12:33):
money is coming from, where money is going to the
idea that this is going to turn us into a
surveillance state. The Big Brother is watching that ship sailed
years ago, right like we're already there we're already there. Yeah,
if you don't want to be on the grid, use cash,
get rid of your social media, don't have a credit card,
be very very careful about even having an email account,
(12:54):
and I don't know, get a dial up phone for
your wall in your kitchen, and don't talk to me
on a mobile phone. It's conspiracy theory thinking at its
its most basic, and I just don't buy it. The
government already has all the information they need is kind
of where I'm going with that.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
So you alluded to it earlier on in your comments,
The idea that there is quite a lot of misunderstanding
about what this policy is and what it is going
to I guess give us as a community. Can you
just unpack some of that for us?
Speaker 1 (13:28):
Yeah, okay, so let's go through. I'm going to go
through each platform and I'll do this fairly quickly. All
this information is available online. But if you listen to
the pod and you're sort of going, oh, yeah, I
need to figure out what we're doing about this YouTube.
What stays for under sixteens is this full access to
view or content, but you're going to be accountless, You're
going to be logged out. That includes via web browsers.
It includes the YouTube app. As an under sixteen, you're
(13:50):
logged out unless you're using your parents account because sometimes
parents stay logged in like on the TV or something
like that, you're going to be logged out. And therefore
what goes is the cross device, cross session personalized algorithmic recommendations.
You know how when you're on one device and you're
going to the next device and you can kind of
pick up watching what you're watching from elsewhere, it knows,
(14:11):
it knows who you are, it knows what you've been watching,
and it continues to recommend things to you because it
knows you on all of your devices. So that goes.
The ability to upload and post content goes, and the
ability to interact with strangers in the comments goes for
YouTube as well. When it comes to Instagram, very very
limited access. So as part of the way that they
acquire users on Instagram, Meta pretty much restricts access to
(14:33):
people who have an account. You can get public access
to landing pages and maybe a little bit, but they
pretty strongly restrict browsing of any public content unless you
have an account, and that's a business decision made by Meta,
that's not an Australian government decision. So what's going to
go if you're under sixteen? There goes the cross device,
cross session of personalized algorithmic recommendations. Again, it doesn't know
(14:54):
who you are. You also won't be able to have
unlimited scrolling. That's just gone. That's against the way that
Instagram works. You'll lose the ability to upload and post content,
the ability to react to or comment on other people's posts,
the ability to interact with strangers via the comments, the
ability to interact with strangers via DMS, no more direct messaging. Also,
(15:15):
there won't be any notifications that lure you back to
the platform, and you're going to lose most access unless
Meta changes as policy, and you also won't have meta
AI access, which I think is fantastic and that's going
to apply pretty much across Facebook as well.
Speaker 3 (15:29):
So that is really going to impact how our teenagers communicate.
Speaker 1 (15:34):
Yeah, one hundred percent. And again that's why building that
community and finding ways to fill that vacuum, fill that hole,
making sure that kids have got a way to be
in touch with each other matters. Good news is there
are I mean Wayne Warburton about a month ago on
the podcast when I raised that with him. He just said,
it's just ridiculous. There are so many ways for kids
to get in touch with each other even without using
the dominant social media platforms that if they're crying foul
(15:55):
over that, they're just not using their imaginations. It's still
completely doable. What about okay, So TikTok once again, here's
what stays. All of the public content via a web
browser that's going to remain available as it currently is.
Any public content and landing pages that you can access
without an account, you'll still be able to see that,
and you will be able to see the comments from
(16:17):
other users. But remember this, the TikTok mobile app will
require an account to use, and if you're under sixteen,
you won't be allowed to have an account. So here's
what goes access to private content once again, the cross device,
cross session, personalized algorithmic recommendations that I'm going to just
throw in here. TikTok is a China It's owned by ByteDance,
(16:38):
which is a Chinese owned company, and the CCP, the
Chinese Communist Party, has their tentacles into every single Chinese organization,
so fundamentally those recommendations are controlled by the Chinese government,
and I think that that's going to be a really
good thing that our young kids aren't being exposed to
what the Chinese government wants them to see. If you're
on TikTok and you're under sixteen, you won't be able
to upload and post content, or react to or comment
(17:01):
on other people's posts, or react with strangers, or send
direct messages, and you won't get those notifications bringing you
back to the platform. It's basically the same with Snapchat
as well. That's the only platform that we haven't covered.
That's one of the major ones. You still get all
the public content via web browsers, but Snapchat is designed
to use with an account, So if you are a
(17:21):
teenager under sixteen, you're not going to have disappearing messages,
you're not going to get access to private content, you're
not going to get the gamified streaks that increase that
pressure to keep you there. You're going to lose the notifications,
all the stuff that we're talking about. This is going
to severely hamper restricts, reduce access to and time on
social media for our young people if they're under sixteen.
(17:42):
There will be ways around it because people always find it,
but generally speaking when social media platforms are going to
get stung forty nine point five million dollars for not
taking every reasonable precaution. This is a win for our
young people.
Speaker 3 (17:53):
So guess my last question for you is understanding and
recognizing how prevalent the use of social media has been
for about thirteen plus and sometimes much younger children. In essence,
we're going cold turkey. One day they're going to have
access and the next day they're not. Right, is there
going to be anything available to parents to help them
(18:14):
navigate that transition period.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
I keep on getting so many like I've had so
many interviews in the press and in the media about this,
and my response is they'll be okay, Like they'll be
a little bit sad, they'll be a little bit frustrated,
and then they'll figure it out. Kids are creative, Kids have ingenuity.
Kids will start to hassle you about different ways that
they can contact their friends. You'll have to do that
thing that parents used to do before social media, Like
go back fifteen twenty years where parents used to talk
(18:37):
to each other about getting the kids together, and then
the kids are going to have to do things like
ring each other or send each other text messages or
get on the bike and ride to each other's houses. Again,
there are going to be some kids who struggle. There
are going to be some disadvantages. I'm not denying that,
but overwhelmingly I think this is a net positive.
Speaker 3 (18:55):
I think back on our parenting journey and I remember
the day our eldest received, against our desire, a mobile phone,
and I look at the lives that we lived before
those small devices were placed in our kids' hands, and
maybe I'm wearing rose colored glasses, but family life was
(19:17):
so much simpler. There were some challenges, obviously, family life
is full of it. It's messy, but on the whole,
the challenges that we were experiencing were everyday challenges as
opposed to a constant navigation of impactful negatively impactful information
(19:39):
that our children are being fed on a daily basis.
And as much as there's been some good that's come
out of them, honestly, I'd go back to the day
when my phone was stuck on a wall any day.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
I know we're sounding like a couple of old fogies
right now, but I just don't think that the changes
that social media has brought to the world have been
a fundamentally positive. I think social media has been an
overall net negative in far too many lives to justify
its existence.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
If for no other reason, then it zaps our time
and literally takes us away out I've lost human people
that matter most in our lives.
Speaker 1 (20:14):
If anyway, I'm going to talk to Julian and Grant,
the ESCAPT Commissioner, in the next couple of weeks about
more around this. If this has been helpful, please share
it with somebody you know who's maybe struggling with or
has some questions around these topics. And play it for
your kids as well, because the kids will want to
know what's going on and this could be helpful. Play
it on one and a half speed. I mean, they
don't need to listen to us talk in slow motion.
(20:36):
The Happy Families podcast has been produced today by Justin
Ruland from Bridge Medium. Imhammits provides additional research, admin and
other support, and if you'd like more information about making
your family happy, visit us at happy families dot com
dot au.
Hello, this is the Happy Families Podcast. Minimum age legislation
is creeping up. It's only a couple of months away now.
December tenth is when the Federal Government's Social Media minimum
age legislation kicks off. In a lot of ways, this
is first of its kind across the globe and there
are a lot of people who are watching with interest.
(00:27):
Today on the Happy Families Podcast, we unpack what it means,
what people misunderstand, and a whole lot more about how
this thing is actually going to work. The clock's ticking
and we're going to tell you all about it right
after this. Stay with us. Hello, Welcome to the Happy
Families Podcast. It's real parenting solutions every single day on
(00:49):
Australia's most downloaded parenting podcast. We love that you choose
to listen to us. Hopefully you've had a great school holidays.
A couple of states still going through their holidays, but
here in Queensland where we live, it's back to school
and we're kicking off the term with a conversation that
is on a lot of people's minds. The Social Media
Minimum Age Legislation. Term four is the last term of
(01:09):
school where kids under sixteen get access to social media.
It's all about to change.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Tilly died at just fifteen today. Her mom took her
story from regional New South Wales to the world, speaking
at the United Nations. Exhausted and broken, she just couldn't
fight anymore, and social media played a direct role in
(01:36):
her death.
Speaker 3 (01:37):
Well, I've got a whole heap of questions for you today, Okay,
I'd really love to unpack this because I think that
there's plenty of parents who either don't understand the policy
and what's going to change for them and their children,
or kind of misunderstand what the purpose of it is.
So my first question for you is what does this
(01:59):
policy actually do.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
So the policy is designed literally to limit access to
social media platforms to children under the age of sixteen.
That's it in a nutshell. It's pretty widely misunderstood. It's
been very much mischaracterized around the world. But if I
was to read this directly from the E Safety Commissioner's
(02:24):
FAQ about it, it says this age restricted platforms won't
be allowed to let under sixteens create or keep an account,
and that's because being logged into an account increases the
likelihood that they're going to be exposed to pressures and
risks that can be hard to deal with. These come
from social media platform design features that encourage them to
spend more time on screens while also serving up content
(02:46):
that can harm their health and well being. Under sixteens
and this is critical will still be able to see
publicly available social media content that doesn't require being logged
into an account to view. Okay, So that's what it does.
It keeps kids from having an account, It keeps kids
from getting access to anything that's locked down behind an account.
(03:08):
But if there is content on social media platforms that
is available for public viewing, children and teachers and whoever
else will be able to access that content and it
will be able to be viewed.
Speaker 3 (03:19):
So you're suggesting that you don't need to have a
profile to be able to access publicly available content.
Speaker 1 (03:27):
Yeah, exactly, even now as an adult. So I believe
that you don't have a TikTok account, right, yep, But
you can still jump online and look for short videos
and TikTok content will come up in your online search.
You don't have to have an account to be able
to see the content. So the social media minimum age
legislation once more does not stop kids from viewing content
(03:50):
on social media. They can see publicly available social media
content so long as it doesn't require being logged into
an account. If people have privacy settings on, you have
to have an account to be able to get in
there and be friends with them whatever. But they will
not be able to keep an account, create an account,
and therefore have the algorithm doing what algorithms do, which
(04:12):
serves up increasingly half for material and provides ongoingly compelling
content to keep them there longer.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
So it seems like a really lofty goal on the
government's part to I guess rain in some control over
what has been just openly available to these kids.
Speaker 1 (04:32):
Yeah, I mean social media has been the wild wildwist
it still is.
Speaker 3 (04:36):
How are they going to monitor it? Like, how do
they know that this child is sixteen or We've seen
so many times that kids are pretty clever and they
know how to get their way around all these different
controls and platforms, So how do they monitor it?
Speaker 1 (04:54):
So I'm going to be talking with Julie Inman Grant,
the e Safety Commissioner, in a couple of weeks and
ask a little bit more about this. The details on
this are a little bit skinny, but basically, again from
the FAQ on the E Safety Commission's website, there is
a range of technologies available to check age at the
point of account sign up and later on as well.
It's going to be up to each platform to decide
(05:15):
which method they choose to use, and E Safety is
going to publish regulatory guidance to help platforms to decide
which methods are going to be most effective and comply
with the Online Safety Act. The guidelines as well are
going to draw on the Australian Government's Age Assurance Technology
trial as well as a whole lot of stakeholder consultations,
and essentially, no Australian is going to be forced to
(05:37):
use government ID to prove their age online. The age
restricted social media platforms have to offer reasonable alternatives to users,
but basically this is going to be on the platforms
to make sure that all users are over the age
of sixteen.
Speaker 3 (05:54):
So I find this part curious then, because we've done
so many podcasts we've actually acknowledged that these platforms do
not have our children's best interests at heart, correct, and
yet all of a sudden we're actually putting the onus
back on them to take care of our kids.
Speaker 1 (06:09):
Yeah, and that's because too many parents either won't do
it or be want to be their kids' best friends,
so they actively assist them to be online or see,
it's just too hard, like parents are just what they're trying.
They're trying, they're trying, and the kids find ways around it.
So now the focus is very much on what the
platforms are going to do to keep kids off.
Speaker 3 (06:28):
So who gets in trouble if someone falls through the cracks?
Is it the platform or is it parents and kids?
Speaker 1 (06:33):
Okay, So again, if we have a look at the
FAQ on the E Safety website, it says this there
are no penalties for under sixteens who access an age
restricted social media platform. There are no penalties for their
parents or cares. This is about protecting young people, not
punishing or isolating them. The goal is to help parents
and cares support their health and well being of under sixteens.
The penalties therefore go to the platforms. A court can
(06:57):
order civil penalties for platforms that don't take reasonable steps
to prevent underage users from having accounts on their platforms.
This includes court imposed fines of up to a total
of forty nine point five million Australian dollars. That is,
for each case brought against Meta or against TikTok, or
(07:20):
against Snap or against a YouTube. For each case where
it can be proved that they have not taken reasonable
steps to prevent an under sixteen accessing their platform, they
can be fined up to forty nine point five million dollars.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
I know you and a handful of your colleagues worked
really hard to get this legislation in place, and I
know that it means a lot to you, But I
am curious. Do you really think that this is going
to move the needle at all for our kids?
Speaker 1 (07:58):
Yeah? I mean it will. It's not going to change everything.
They've still got access to gaming. There's still work to
be done in terms of access to explicit content. They
will still be able to be on the platforms in
one form or another, in that the platforms can continue
to serve up content in the public domain, and kids
and screens are inextricably linked. But I think it is
(08:18):
going to soften the impact of the platforms. I think
the platforms for under sixteens are going to become less engaging,
and that's because the algorithm no longer knows who they are.
They can't log in unless they're using their parents accounts,
and I don't know too many parents that are going
to be like, of course, you can have my social
media account. Here's the thing I reckon. There's going to
(08:39):
be some parents who are going to sign up for
like a second account and just let the kids use
that one. You can be me. But the algorithm, apparently
this is hearsay. We'll be able to tell whether it's
a teenager using the account or not, and hopefully that
will flag it and be like, Okay, a parent has
signed up for this pretended it's them, but it's actually
the child. I have a sense that the technology company
(09:02):
is going to be able to figure out who's using it,
and forty nine point five million dollar fines are not
attractive to companies like this. This should work. Let me
also highlight there is enormous support among parents and even
surprisingly some growing support among young people for this ban
(09:23):
for this minimum age legislation. Ahead of the implementation, YouGov
did a survey and found that seventy seven percent of
Australians back the under sixteen social media minimum age legislation.
That's up from sixty one percent just a few months earlier,
there's only twenty three percent that opposed the measure. In addition,
(09:45):
eighty seven percent of Austrains support the introduction of stronger
penalties for social media companies that are doing this. The
polls are showing really strong support across all aspects of
the government's proposed social media regulations.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
So I feel like there are going to be so
many found is that are going to be breathing a
sigh of relief that finally they have a village that's
actually starting to recognize the damage that this is doing
to individuals and family units. But I'm also concerned that
in doing so, parents become less vigilant. And I think
(10:22):
that this actually would suggest that more than ever, as parents,
we actually need to band together and we need to
be more vigilant than we've ever been because we've now
been given this safeguard. It's in place, and if we
can honor that safeguard and work together as communities to
continue to safeguard our children in more profoundly impactful ways,
(10:47):
that's when the needle shifts, not because the government's put
in this policy.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
Yeah, so nature will fill a vacuum, and if the
kids aren't able to do X, y Z, they'll find
something else to do there. And so it's going to
be up to us to make sure that we're delaying
access to screen, having conversations with kids about what they're
doing on screens, and giving them in riching environments where
they can go and be creative, come up with other ideas,
do other things that are going to be far more
in their best interests. If we just think, oh, well,
(11:12):
the government's done it now we don't have to do anything,
then we're selling our children short. And we're also we
have far too much belief in the power of legislation.
It can move the needle, but it's not going to
change everything.
Speaker 3 (11:23):
I was actually speaking with a young man recently about
his real fears that this is just another ploy from
the government to take control of us. They want they
want they want our id they want to you know,
they want to know everything about us, and that we're
heading towards a dictatorship because we no longer have the
choice to decide whether or not we will have an account.
Speaker 1 (11:46):
How do you allay those fears?
Speaker 3 (11:48):
Because for him it was real, like it was intensely
real for him.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
So a couple of things. First, of all, young men
and young women who are getting all of their news
from influencers who are spreading fear and panic are just
going to end up with anxiety and be miserable about it.
Number two, you don't have to have an account if
you don't want to, so nobody's getting your details if
you're not putting your details up there. If you do
want to have an account, guess what. Alphabet is the
parent company of Google, who also owns YouTube and Meta.
(12:12):
They know more about you than you know about you,
and they like, if you're worried about the government knowing
about you, I'd be just as concerned, if not more concerned,
about what these corporations know. And they know everything. And
by the way, the government knows everything about you as well.
They know where you live. They've got all of your
ID already because of things like driver's licenses and passports
and because of spending habits. The ATO does actually talk
to the banks and gets all the information about where
(12:33):
money is coming from, where money is going to the
idea that this is going to turn us into a
surveillance state. The Big Brother is watching that ship sailed
years ago, right like we're already there we're already there. Yeah,
if you don't want to be on the grid, use cash,
get rid of your social media, don't have a credit card,
be very very careful about even having an email account,
(12:54):
and I don't know, get a dial up phone for
your wall in your kitchen, and don't talk to me
on a mobile phone. It's conspiracy theory thinking at its
its most basic, and I just don't buy it. The
government already has all the information they need is kind
of where I'm going with that.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
So you alluded to it earlier on in your comments,
The idea that there is quite a lot of misunderstanding
about what this policy is and what it is going
to I guess give us as a community. Can you
just unpack some of that for us?
Speaker 1 (13:28):
Yeah, okay, so let's go through. I'm going to go
through each platform and I'll do this fairly quickly. All
this information is available online. But if you listen to
the pod and you're sort of going, oh, yeah, I
need to figure out what we're doing about this YouTube.
What stays for under sixteens is this full access to
view or content, but you're going to be accountless, You're
going to be logged out. That includes via web browsers.
It includes the YouTube app. As an under sixteen, you're
(13:50):
logged out unless you're using your parents account because sometimes
parents stay logged in like on the TV or something
like that, you're going to be logged out. And therefore
what goes is the cross device, cross session personalized algorithmic recommendations.
You know how when you're on one device and you're
going to the next device and you can kind of
pick up watching what you're watching from elsewhere, it knows,
(14:11):
it knows who you are, it knows what you've been watching,
and it continues to recommend things to you because it
knows you on all of your devices. So that goes.
The ability to upload and post content goes, and the
ability to interact with strangers in the comments goes for
YouTube as well. When it comes to Instagram, very very
limited access. So as part of the way that they
acquire users on Instagram, Meta pretty much restricts access to
(14:33):
people who have an account. You can get public access
to landing pages and maybe a little bit, but they
pretty strongly restrict browsing of any public content unless you
have an account, and that's a business decision made by Meta,
that's not an Australian government decision. So what's going to
go if you're under sixteen? There goes the cross device,
cross session of personalized algorithmic recommendations. Again, it doesn't know
(14:54):
who you are. You also won't be able to have
unlimited scrolling. That's just gone. That's against the way that
Instagram works. You'll lose the ability to upload and post content,
the ability to react to or comment on other people's posts,
the ability to interact with strangers via the comments, the
ability to interact with strangers via DMS, no more direct messaging. Also,
(15:15):
there won't be any notifications that lure you back to
the platform, and you're going to lose most access unless
Meta changes as policy, and you also won't have meta
AI access, which I think is fantastic and that's going
to apply pretty much across Facebook as well.
Speaker 3 (15:29):
So that is really going to impact how our teenagers communicate.
Speaker 1 (15:34):
Yeah, one hundred percent. And again that's why building that
community and finding ways to fill that vacuum, fill that hole,
making sure that kids have got a way to be
in touch with each other matters. Good news is there
are I mean Wayne Warburton about a month ago on
the podcast when I raised that with him. He just said,
it's just ridiculous. There are so many ways for kids
to get in touch with each other even without using
the dominant social media platforms that if they're crying foul
(15:55):
over that, they're just not using their imaginations. It's still
completely doable. What about okay, So TikTok once again, here's
what stays. All of the public content via a web
browser that's going to remain available as it currently is.
Any public content and landing pages that you can access
without an account, you'll still be able to see that,
and you will be able to see the comments from
(16:17):
other users. But remember this, the TikTok mobile app will
require an account to use, and if you're under sixteen,
you won't be allowed to have an account. So here's
what goes access to private content once again, the cross device,
cross session, personalized algorithmic recommendations that I'm going to just
throw in here. TikTok is a China It's owned by ByteDance,
(16:38):
which is a Chinese owned company, and the CCP, the
Chinese Communist Party, has their tentacles into every single Chinese organization,
so fundamentally those recommendations are controlled by the Chinese government,
and I think that that's going to be a really
good thing that our young kids aren't being exposed to
what the Chinese government wants them to see. If you're
on TikTok and you're under sixteen, you won't be able
to upload and post content, or react to or comment
(17:01):
on other people's posts, or react with strangers, or send
direct messages, and you won't get those notifications bringing you
back to the platform. It's basically the same with Snapchat
as well. That's the only platform that we haven't covered.
That's one of the major ones. You still get all
the public content via web browsers, but Snapchat is designed
to use with an account, So if you are a
(17:21):
teenager under sixteen, you're not going to have disappearing messages,
you're not going to get access to private content, you're
not going to get the gamified streaks that increase that
pressure to keep you there. You're going to lose the notifications,
all the stuff that we're talking about. This is going
to severely hamper restricts, reduce access to and time on
social media for our young people if they're under sixteen.
(17:42):
There will be ways around it because people always find it,
but generally speaking when social media platforms are going to
get stung forty nine point five million dollars for not
taking every reasonable precaution. This is a win for our
young people.
Speaker 3 (17:53):
So guess my last question for you is understanding and
recognizing how prevalent the use of social media has been
for about thirteen plus and sometimes much younger children. In essence,
we're going cold turkey. One day they're going to have
access and the next day they're not. Right, is there
going to be anything available to parents to help them
(18:14):
navigate that transition period.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
I keep on getting so many like I've had so
many interviews in the press and in the media about this,
and my response is they'll be okay, Like they'll be
a little bit sad, they'll be a little bit frustrated,
and then they'll figure it out. Kids are creative, Kids have ingenuity.
Kids will start to hassle you about different ways that
they can contact their friends. You'll have to do that
thing that parents used to do before social media, Like
go back fifteen twenty years where parents used to talk
(18:37):
to each other about getting the kids together, and then
the kids are going to have to do things like
ring each other or send each other text messages or
get on the bike and ride to each other's houses. Again,
there are going to be some kids who struggle. There
are going to be some disadvantages. I'm not denying that,
but overwhelmingly I think this is a net positive.
Speaker 3 (18:55):
I think back on our parenting journey and I remember
the day our eldest received, against our desire, a mobile phone,
and I look at the lives that we lived before
those small devices were placed in our kids' hands, and
maybe I'm wearing rose colored glasses, but family life was
(19:17):
so much simpler. There were some challenges, obviously, family life
is full of it. It's messy, but on the whole,
the challenges that we were experiencing were everyday challenges as
opposed to a constant navigation of impactful negatively impactful information
(19:39):
that our children are being fed on a daily basis.
And as much as there's been some good that's come
out of them, honestly, I'd go back to the day
when my phone was stuck on a wall any day.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
I know we're sounding like a couple of old fogies
right now, but I just don't think that the changes
that social media has brought to the world have been
a fundamentally positive. I think social media has been an
overall net negative in far too many lives to justify
its existence.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
If for no other reason, then it zaps our time
and literally takes us away out I've lost human people
that matter most in our lives.
Speaker 1 (20:14):
If anyway, I'm going to talk to Julian and Grant,
the ESCAPT Commissioner, in the next couple of weeks about
more around this. If this has been helpful, please share
it with somebody you know who's maybe struggling with or
has some questions around these topics. And play it for
your kids as well, because the kids will want to
know what's going on and this could be helpful. Play
it on one and a half speed. I mean, they
don't need to listen to us talk in slow motion.
(20:36):
The Happy Families podcast has been produced today by Justin
Ruland from Bridge Medium. Imhammits provides additional research, admin and
other support, and if you'd like more information about making
your family happy, visit us at happy families dot com
dot au.
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