An advocacy group that pushed for children and teens under 16 to be banned from social media has supported YouTube being given an exemption, but warns there is still a risk of kids being able to create accounts on the video site.
On Thursday, the federal government introduced legislation to parliament to ban kids under 16 from social media sites like Facebook, TikTok, Instagram and Snapchat.
But children and young teens will still be allowed to use YouTube, WhatsApp and gaming services.
That’s because the government has excluded “messaging apps,” “online gaming services” and “services with the primary purpose of supporting the health and education of end-users” from the ban.
Online gaming services also won’t be captured by the government’s proposed social media ban for children and teens under 16. (ABC News: Rebecca Trigger)
Director of the 36 Months campaign, Greg Atwells, backed in the exemption, telling the ABC the goal was never to stop young people from communicating or accessing educational tools and entertainment online, but rather to protect them from addictive algorithms and online bullying.
“Using YouTube for entertainment and educational purposes I think is fair enough … it’s where people pretty much learn how to do things, I learnt to change the oil in my car,” he said.
But he added that watching YouTube videos without logging in was very different to kids being allowed to have an account where they can comment on, and upload, content.
He pointed to American singer Rebecca Black as an example of someone who experienced online trolling, after uploading her song Friday to YouTube at age 13.
Rebecca Black uploaded her song Friday to YouTube age 13. (YouTube)
In an ideal world, he hoped YouTube would seek to make its site safer off its own back by requiring parental permission for kids under 16 who want to create an account and turning off commenting for children and teens.
But he ultimately acknowledged if that fell within the legislation, it would have increased its complexity and likely made it harder to pass.
The ABC understands that teachers and even The Wiggles were among those who called for a YouTube carve out because of the site’s educational values.
Senate committee to report by Tuesday
After the legislation was released on Thursday morning, senators quickly pushed for an inquiry to be able to scrutinise the bill in further detail. The government agreed to one that must report back by Tuesday.
Introducing the bill, Communications Minister Michelle Rowland said social media had already caused young people too much harm and action was needed.
“The bill puts the onus on social media platforms, not parents or young people, to take reasonable steps to ensure fundamental protections are in place,” she said.
Michelle Rowland says social media platforms are not enforcing their own rules. (ABC News: Ian Cutmore)
Opposition communications spokesman David Coleman said the Coalition would work with the government to finalise the legislation, stressing the urgency for action.
“Parents lie awake at night worrying about what their kids are being exposed to on Snapchat, or TikTok, or Instagram,” he said.
“We’ve seen very disturbing mental health trends for Australian children — especially girls — over the past decade.”
Privacy, reliability concerns remain
The government has committed to trialling age assurance technology to help check a user’s age, but Toby Murray, an associate professor from the University of Melbourne’s computing school, questioned how effective it would be.
“The way that this ban is going to be enforced is not at all obvious at this stage,” he said.
“There’s a lot of concern that that kind of technology could be really invasive in terms of privacy.”
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has acknowledged the ban won’t be perfect — repeatedly comparing it to how some kids under 18 find ways to access alcohol — but Dr Murray said he was particularly concerned about the unintended consequences the ban might have, such as kids moving to “underground” platforms that are even less safe.
“A ban like this means that the kids who do work around it and are able to access Snapchat or Instagram, even though they’re under 16, that those platforms may well be less safe for those kids than had a ban like this not been implemented in the first place,” he said.
Some experts have questioned whether YouTube can be considered less harmful than other social media platforms. (ABC News: Ian Cutmore)
That view was repeated by Digital Industry Group Inc, which advocates on behalf of some of the platforms. It warned against the ban being rushed.
“Neither experts nor the community have been consulted on the details of the legislation being released today, and we need to hear from them before this becomes law,” managing director Sunita Bose said in a statement.
“A blunt ban doesn’t encourage companies to continually improve safety because the focus is on keeping teenagers off the service, rather than keeping them safe when they’re on it.”
Dr Murray also emphasised it was unclear why YouTube was deemed less harmful than Snapchat.
