YouTube included in Australia’s world-first social media reforms

Australian children under 16 years of age will no longer be able to have a YouTube account once the Government’s social media age ban comes into effect.

The Government has decided to include YouTube in the age restriction laws due to take effect from December 10 after receiving advice from Australia’s eSafety Commissioner* that the platform has similar functions to other social media platforms — like TikTok and Instagram — that are currently used by but deemed harmful to children.

Communications Minister Anika Wells made the announcement in Canberra on Wednesday, saying the government was giving kids a rest “from the persuasive and pervasive* pull of social media”.

“There is no one perfect solution when it comes to keeping young Australians safer online – but the social media minimum age will make a significantly positive difference to their wellbeing,” she said.

YouTube was not originally included in the federal ban on social media for kids under the age of 16. The Albanese Government initially argued it could be educational.

But in June, Ms Wells published advice from eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant recommending YouTube be added to the ban because the platform had features the law was designed to protect children from, like autoplay: “endless” and “algorithmically*” recommended content.

Ms Inman Grant had also separately warned that kids were using YouTube more than any other social media platform.

“It’s almost ubiquitous* that kids are on social media,” she said last month, speaking to the ABC.

“By far the most prevalent* social media site they’re on is YouTube.

“And when we asked where they were experiencing harm and the kinds of harms they were experiencing, the most prevalent place where young Australians experienced harm was on YouTube – almost 37 per cent.”

Ms Inman Grant said banning younger Australians from holding a YouTube account would still mean kids could watch videos through links from school or in a “logged-out state”.

When browsing YouTube without being logged in, users aren’t able to view content that has an age restriction of 18+.

But YouTube has criticised this proposal, arguing safety measures designed to protect children on the platform could not be applied if a young user did not have an account.

A spokesman for YouTube said the company shared the government’s goal of “addressing and reducing online harms” but said that the platform was “not social media”.

“Our position remains clear: YouTube is a video sharing platform with a library of free, high-quality content, increasingly viewed on TV screens,” he said.

The spokesman also said the government’s decision to include YouTube in the social media ban reversed a “clear, public commitment” to exclude the platform last year.

“We will consider next steps and will continue to engage with the Government,” he said.

Ms Wells said the government’s social media rules were “not a set and forget”.

“They are a set and support,” she said.

“There’s a place for social media, but there’s not a place for predatory algorithms* targeting children.

“We want kids to know who they are before platforms assume who they are.”

It is understood that the YouTube Kids app won’t be included in the ban.

Last month, the people tasked with finding a way to enforce the ban said it would be possible but that there was no magic solution and firms would need to use a range of different measures to prevent underage people from using their platforms.

One option mentioned by the taskforce was successive validation*, which is a series of tests designed to prove a user’s age.

Ms Wells said companies that failed to take reasonable steps to prevent kids under the age of 16 from creating accounts would face fines of up to $49.5 million.

Anthony Albanese said his government was making it clear it was “on the side of families”.

“Social media has a social responsibility and there is no doubt that Australian kids are being negatively impacted by online platforms so I’m calling time on it,” he said.

The decision to add YouTube to the ban could prompt the platform’s owners Google to follow through with a threat to sue the government on “constitutional grounds”.

In a letter sent to Ms Wells last week, lawyers for Google warned the company was “considering its legal position” and outlined three possible options.

One of those options was a potential High Court challenge arguing the ban would be an “impermissible fetter* on the implied constitutional* freedom of political communication*”.

POLL

GLOSSARY

• pervasive: being everywhere, impossible to escape
• eSafety Commissioner: a person set up to protect Australians from online harm
• algorithmically: performed by algorithms, a series of instructions and tasks performed by a computer or computer learning
• ubiquitous: found everywhere
• prevalent: widespread in a particular era
• predatory algorithms: machine learning that targets a particular type of person and hooks them into consuming more and more content even when it is not healthy for them to do so
• successive validation: a system that undergoes a series of evaluations and assessments over time to make sure it meets the right criteria
• impermissible fetter: a chain or restraint that cannot be allowed
• constitutional: relating to the founding principles governing the country
• political communication: speaking about politics and the way the country is run, communication between politicians and the public

EXTRA READING
U16 social media ban becomes law
PM outlines U16 social media ban
Kids beware: rise of ‘AI influencer’

QUICK QUIZ
1. Why was YouTube originally excluded from the under 16 ban on social media?
2. Why has it now been included in the ban?
3. When will the new laws take effect?
4. What is one way the ban could be enforced?
5. How has YouTube’s parent company Google responded to news of the ban?

LISTEN TO THIS STORY

CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES
1. What do you think?
Do you think that YouTube is social media? Write a list of convincing reasons why or why not.

Time: allow at least 15 minutes to complete this activity
Curriculum Links: English, Information Technology

2. Extension
What do you think would help kids learn to use social media safely and responsibly? Write a letter to the eSafety Commissioner explaining the steps that you think should be taken to keep kids safe online.

Time: allow at least 30 minutes to complete this activity
Curriculum Links: English, Personal and Social Capability

VCOP ACTIVITY
Wow word recycle
There are plenty of wow words (ambitious pieces of vocabulary) being used in the article. Some are in the glossary, but there might be extra ones from the article that you think are exceptional as well.

Identify all the words in the article that you think are not common words, and particularly good choices for the writer to have chosen.

Select three words you have highlighted to recycle into your own sentences.

If any of the words you identified are not in the glossary, write up your own glossary for them.

Extension
Find a bland sentence from the article to up-level. Can you add more detail and description? Can you replace any base words with more specific synonyms?

Down-level for a younger audience. Find a sentence in the article that is high level. Now rewrite it for a younger audience so they can understand the words without using the glossary.