On 10 December 2025, Australia became the first country in the world to impose an obligation on the operators of affected social media platforms to take reasonable measures to prevent children under 16 from opening or maintaining an account. Since then, as numerous governments look to the Australian experiment to consider adopting similar measures, the question is whether the ban is actually working or whether it risks turning into a failed precedent. So let’s see how it’s going.

To begin with, in the first months of application eSafety, the Australian online safety authority, concentrated its activity on ten platforms: Facebook, Instagram, Kick, Reddit, Snapchat, Threads, TikTok, Twitch, X and YouTube. It then moved on two fronts: on the one hand the monitoring of the industry, on the other the information aimed at children, parents and teachers.

The departure was significant. According to data communicated by eSafety, by mid-December 2025 the platforms had already removed, deactivated or limited approximately 4.7 million accounts attributable to users under the age threshold. By early March 2026, another 300,000 accounts had been blocked or barred from access. It should be noted, however, that we are talking about accounts, not actual users: each minor could in fact have multiple accounts, even on different platforms.

The trick of age and “smart” selfies

Age verification is, as expected, the most critical aspect of the system. Although in June 2025 the first findings of the Age Assurance Technology Trial indicated the absence of significant technological barriers to the implementation of the ban, several critical issues emerged in the following months.

First, the system does not provide a single, binding technical standard for determining whether a platform has taken “reasonable measures”. This leaves managers with a margin of discretion which, in some cases, has resulted in weak or easily circumvented controls. The share of minors with at least one social account, according to the survey conducted by eSafety among parents, fell from 49.7% to 31.3%. But among parents who said their child already had an account on some platforms before the ban, about 7 in 10 say that account is still present on Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat or TikTok. For YouTube the indicated share is lower, but still relevant.

The problem is twofold. In many cases, minors have not yet been asked by the platform to verify their age. In others, they manage to maintain or reactivate access, while the platforms are not very responsive to reports from parents and teachers. Additionally, eSafety did not observe a significant decline in reports of cyberbullying and image-based abuse involving restricted accounts compared to the same period in 2025.

The checks conducted by eSafety therefore show a mixed picture. On the one hand, many platforms have adopted age control tools and, at least for now, a widespread problem of undue exclusion of users over 16 does not appear to have emerged. On the other hand, in some cases minors were actually encouraged to repeat the age verification or were able to make numerous attempts until obtaining a favorable result. Age estimation systems, particularly those based on facial estimation, show margins of error precisely in the most relevant age range, allowing some teenagers to maintain or reactivate their accounts.

However, the greatest weaknesses concern the reporting mechanisms and the checks carried out at the time of registration. Many platforms offer channels that are not very accessible to parents and teachers, with complex or ineffective procedures. At the same time, several companies continue to rely on self-declared age, without carrying out additional verification at the time of registration. As a result, many Australian minors have managed to circumvent the restrictions by simply declaring they are at least 16 years old. This is where the gap between the objectives of the legislation and its actual application emerges.

Five giants under investigation: what do they risk?

Of course, there are fines for those who do not comply with obligations, but any sanctioning action requires sufficient evidence. It is not enough to demonstrate that some minors are still present on the platforms: it must be demonstrated that the platform has not adopted adequate systems and processes.

So far eSafety has issued 23 binding information requests to the 10 platforms subject to the rule. Although the number of minors with active accounts has decreased, it is clear that a significant share of under 16s are still present on social media. Formal investigations are currently underway across five platforms: Snapchat, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.

The balance is therefore contradictory: something has moved, but not enough. The numbers of accounts removed are significant, but the share of minors still present on the platforms highlights the limits of a rule that places the responsibility for enforcement on companies without imposing binding and uniform technical standards. The game will now be played on eSafety’s decisions: the authority aims to evaluate possible enforcement actions by mid-2026.