Australia accuses major tech firms of ‘failing to obey the laws’ over online child account ban

Australia’s online safety watchdog said it was considering a court case against Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, and YouTube, alleging they are not doing enough to keep Australian children younger than 16 off their platforms. Experts say the Australian courts could decide what steps the platforms can reasonably be expected to take under the laws that took effect on December 10, banning young children from holding accounts. eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant released her first compliance report since those laws took effect, demanding that ten platforms remove all Australian account holders younger than 16. While five million Australian accounts had been deactivated, a substantial number of Australian children continued to retain accounts, create new accounts, and pass platforms’ age assurance systems, the report said. Inman Grant said in a statement her office had “significant concerns about the compliance” of half of those ten platforms. Her office was gathering evidence against the five that they had not taken “reasonable steps” to prevent young children from holding accounts. Courts could order fines of up to 49.5 million Australian dollars ($33 million) for systemic failures to comply. eSafety would decide on whether to initiate court action against any platform by midyear. Age-restricted platforms that aren’t under investigation are Reddit, X, Kick, Threads, and Twitch. Communications Minister Anika Wells said the five criticized platforms were deliberately not complying with Australian law. “Australia's world-leading social media laws are not failing, but big tech is failing to obey the laws,” Wells told reporters. “We started with our world-leading social media minimum age. We will continue with our digital duty of care that puts the onus on big tech companies to protect Australians from online harm,” she added. eSafety had identified “poor practices” such as platforms allowing unlimited attempts for a user to pass their age assurance methods and prompting the user to try to pass the age assurance method even after they declared themselves underage. Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, told The Associated Press it was committed to complying with Australia’s social media ban. “We’ve also been clear that accurately determining age online is a challenge for the whole industry,” the statement said. This article was provided by The Associated Press.