About Two Accounts per Person in This Age Group
Albanese: "The Measure Is Proving Effective"
On December 10 of last year, Australia became the first major country in the world to block social networking service (SNS) accounts for users under the age of 16. Since then, it has been confirmed that social media companies have deleted or blocked nearly 5 million accounts belonging to users in this age group.
On January 16 (local time), the Australian online safety regulator eSafety announced that, since the implementation of the relevant law last month, 10 regulated social media platforms have deleted or blocked approximately 4.7 million accounts belonging to users under the age of 16. This figure far exceeds initial expectations and is equivalent to about two accounts per person in Australia within this age group.
Julie Inman Grant, Commissioner of eSafety, described these early numbers as encouraging, stating, "Social media platforms are taking meaningful action." She added, "It is clear that eSafety's regulatory guidelines and collaboration with platforms are already achieving significant results."
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese also said at a press conference on the same day, "Today, we can announce that this measure is proving effective," adding, "This is a source of pride for Australia." He further described the blocking of SNS accounts for those under 16 as "world-leading legislative action," and noted, "Now, countries around the world are following our lead."
Australian authorities have stipulated by law that social media companies failing to take reasonable steps to prevent users under 16 from holding accounts may be fined up to 49.5 million Australian dollars (approximately 48.5 billion won). eSafety did not disclose the number of blocked accounts per social media platform.
However, in the case of Meta, the company revealed that since the law came into effect, it has deleted approximately 330,000 Instagram accounts, 173,000 Facebook accounts, and 40,000 Threads accounts suspected to belong to users under 16, totaling about 550,000 accounts.
Commissioner Inman Grant stated, "Despite this law, the use of SNS by minors will not disappear completely," and added, "It may take several years for the law's positive effects to be fully realized." She also announced that eSafety plans to introduce regulations on artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots and AI conversation partner apps in March.
Meanwhile, in addition to Australia, countries such as France, Denmark, New Zealand, Malaysia, Indonesia, and the European Union (EU) are also moving to introduce similar legislation to restrict SNS use by minors.
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