The social media ban is set to begin in December. Will it work?

3 months ago 19

When Robb Evans’ daughter, Liv, recovered from anorexia, she wanted to help others get better. He pledged to stand beside her when that day came.

Instead, Evans stood holding Liv’s ashes in an urn on Wednesday beside two other grieving parents, Mia Bannister and Emma Mason, who also partly blame social media for their children’s deaths.

Next to him, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Communications Minister Anika Wells announced YouTube would be included in the federal government’s social media ban for children under the age of 16.

Parents Mia Bannister (left), Robb Evans and Emma Mason with Communications Minister Anika Wells and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese at a press conference at Parliament House in Canberra on Wednesday.

“I just feel it’s my duty as her dad to have her with me there because it’s for her. It’s not me, I just say the words, but she’s the one that’s achieving the change,” he said.

The government’s laws to keep kids off social media for an extra three years – the current age limit imposed by most platforms is 13 – will come into place in December.

But between now and then there are major hurdles, including the spectre of lawsuits, privacy concerns, ongoing lobbying and, crucially, whether the change will protect children like Liv. Either way, it will weigh on Albanese, who went to the election promising to make the world-first law a reality that would aid children and parents alike.

“I want to see kids … out on the netball courts, playing cricket, playing footy, engaging with each other in the playground rather than on their devices,” Albanese said in January.

The law, passed in November last year, states that social media companies must take reasonable steps to prevent under 16s from creating an account. Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, X and Snapchat were the target platforms. YouTube had a carve-out at the time because it was described by the then-communications minister Michelle Rowland as educational content.

Seven months later, eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman-Grant challenged that description, sharing research with Wells in late June that said four in 10 young teenagers had been exposed to harmful content, such as eating-disorder videos, on YouTube.

That triggered an intense lobbying campaign by YouTube. The website’s owner, Google, sent Wells a legal letter flagging it would consider High Court action, arguing the ban violated the implied constitutional right of freedom of political communication.

There is a lot at stake for the company. Google reported $8.4 billion in gross revenue from Australia in 2022, the last year it made that figure available, giving it the motivation and resources to fight efforts to restrict access from new, young users to one of the company’s key online services.

Then Australian children’s music royalty got involved. The Wiggles’ chief executive Kate Chiodo visited Wells and attempted to appeal to her as a mother of three young children by arguing YouTube’s inclusion in the ban would restrict access to kids’ shows.

Wells was not persuaded.

“I said to them, ‘you’re arguing that my four-year-old twins’ right to a YouTube login is more important than the fact that four out of 10 of their peers will experience online harm on YouTube’,” Wells said on Wednesday.

Responding to this masthead’s request for comment, the Wiggles linked to a Facebook post from Wells – made three years ago – showing a photo of her twin sons and captioned that she handled the parliament by having baby gates and “The Wiggles on YouTube”.

“Video platforms like YouTube, when used to watch trusted children’s programs, function differently to social media,” a Wiggles spokesperson said. “Millions of Australian parents (including Minister Wells) and their children watch the Wiggles on YouTube much like they would on smart TVs, not as part of a social media feed.”

YouTube said in a statement it was considering its legal options, and on Thursday Google cancelled a parliamentary concert (that Wells was intending to attend as communications minister) featuring rock band the Rubens. The company said it was out of respect for the grieving parents at Wednesday’s press conference.

Evans’ anger at YouTube has never abated. Liv was 15 when she died by taking her own life after her battle with anorexia. A lover of cheerleading, animals, art and nature, her early childhood was full of fun and learning. Evans said he noticed a change in Liv when she was 13 and began using Instagram, Snapchat and YouTube.

The browsing on YouTube began with cat videos, then cooking, to healthier recipes, then fitness tips, before it took a darker turn towards how to remain thin.

“She may not be recovered, but I think she would still be here if it weren’t for YouTube,” Robb said.

YouTube has argued there is substantial evidence that it is used regularly for educational purposes, citing a 2024 survey that found 84 per cent of teachers use the platform for lessons.

YouTube Australia and New Zealand public policy manager Rachel Lord said the survey revealed 85 per cent of children and 68 per cent of parents said the platform was appropriate for under 15s, in contrast to other social media companies.

“YouTube is not a social media platform; it is a video-sharing platform with a library of free, high-quality content, and TV screens are increasingly the most popular place to watch,” Lord said in June, following the eSafety commissioner’s advice.

But there is deep disagreement about how effective a social media ban will be in protecting young people.

The government has handed responsibility for enforcement to tech platforms, with big fines if they do not comply. But anyone, including young children, will still be able to access services that do not require a login.

This masthead conducted an experiment using both YouTube and TikTok without an account, scrolling through videos via a desktop with private browsing to avoid the companies relying on previous search history.

YouTube delivered videos designed to trigger engagement that were a far cry from educational, but did not raise obvious red flags. On TikTok, however, in the first three minutes of scrolling, sexualised content, misogynistic messaging and videos themed around death appeared.

None were explicitly pornographic or violent, and this masthead does not suggest the experiment was scientific or would be the same for every user. But the process indicates how internet platforms retain an incentive to show users troubling content to attract their attention even without a login.

Platforms typically serve more videos to a user depending on the preferences they indicate.

“It is difficult to comment on your experiment without knowing the conditions or controls in place when it was conducted,” a TikTok spokeswoman said.

“Everything on TikTok is bound by our strict community guidelines regardless of whether someone is logged in or not. We proactively remove content that breaches those guidelines and, in fact, removed more than 926,000 videos in Australia in [the first quarter of] 2025 alone.”

University of Sydney law professor Anne Twomey said the government’s claim to parents that it had their back in protecting kids from social media was “rubbish” because the ban has numerous carve-outs and exceptions, including for gaming and messaging.

“It is very unlikely all the children will be outside playing footy in the garden. It exempts, for example, online gaming, so if Jonny is shut away in his bedroom doing online gaming, he will keep doing that,” she said. “There is nothing here that gets kids off their computers into the garden.

“Bullying will still happen by using messaging apps, it’s not going to stop kids having their sleep disrupted, it doesn’t do any of that.”

The legislation also does not explain to tech companies what constitutes “reasonable steps” to prevent under 16s from accessing social media, Twomey said.

“That’s a problem for the platforms to deal with because they are entering into the area of the unknown, which is unusual with laws,” she said.

Facial estimation technology and ID verification are some of the ways being proposed to ensure children cannot access social media.

Twomey said the government risks a backlash because the policy was sold to the Australian public as a way to take kids away from technology.

“You can still watch as many videos on as many harmful issues as you like,” she said. “What the law means is you can’t comment, can’t like or dislike or upload your videos.”

Macquarie University psychologist Danielle Einstein disagrees, arguing it will be like banning alcohol for children under 18, creating a cultural understanding that social media at a young age has potentially life-altering affects.

“At the basis of it all, it’s their understanding of the risks and what their view of alcohol is, and that’s what we need to do with social media, is we need to change everyone’s view of social media.”

Einstein – whose research played a role in driving the campaign from advocacy group 36 Months that the parents who stood with Albanese are linked to – said the new laws have already changed people’s views on how technology should be a part of children’s lives and the next step should be presenting a public health campaign to young people.

“We need to work with youth to come up with great messaging, like the tobacco campaign,” she said. “If you give people the correct information about what the harms are and about not wanting to be exploited, then they will come up with messages that help them get the word out.”

Evans said the ban will not be a magic bullet. But he believes politicians from both sides of politics are enacting it because they understand the harms of social media.

“We were here [in Parliament House] in November and spoke to the prime minister and Peter Dutton, they’re both just humans, and they were both moved to tears by Liv’s story … they’re just good people and they just want to do the right thing because it’s the right thing to do and that that takes courage,” Evans said.

“They’re doing it because it just feels like it’s the right thing to do, which is why I will keep speaking about it.”

If you or anyone you know needs support, call Lifeline on 13 11 14, Beyond Blue on 1800 512 348, Kids Helpline on 1800 55 1800.