In a historic move, Australia's Senate on Thursday enacted legislation prohibiting children and teens from accessing social media, the first such decision by any nation.

The legislation, voted on the final day of the current Senate session, is expected to take effect at the end of next year, after which anybody under the age of 16 would be barred from accessing sites such as TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, Reddit, and X.

In support of the measure was Prime Minister Anthony Albanese who described it as "necessary to protect their mental health and well-being."

Under the new laws, social media companies will no longer be allowed to require users to provide government-issued identification, including digital IDs, in order to verify their age, according to ABC News.

The law, which was enacted by the lower house of Parliament on Wednesday, also proposes heavy fines of up to AU$50 million ($32 million) for non-compliant platforms.

The House of Representatives overwhelmingly supported the measure, with 102 votes in favor and only 13 against the prohibition and 34 senators voting in favor while 19 voting against. 

Earlier, Albanese said that social media was "doing social harm," detailing how Australian children should have childhoods and parents should feel supported by the government. 

In a statement last week, he called the reform "a message to social media companies to clean up their act," acknowledging that some minors will find loopholes.

Many social media networks have regulations prohibiting minors from accessing their services, although they are known to be regularly disregarded. Some platforms have been accused of utilizing algorithms to get teens addicted to their services, something corporations strongly deny.

Other countries like the UK and the US have tried taking similar steps. In May 2024, the state of New York also took steps to limit children's exposure to computer algorithmic social media feeds, approving two bills to safeguard children from addicting social media material and their privacy.

Social media pockets $11 billion in advertising from minors

In December 2023, a study from Harvard's T.H. Chan School of Public Health showed that social media companies collectively generated a staggering $11 billion in advertising revenue from minors in the United States. 

The study highlights the potential harms to youth mental health and advocates for increased transparency and regulatory measures to counter harmful advertising practices targeting children and adolescents.

According to the Harvard study, YouTube topped the list in ad revenue from users 12 and under ($959.1 million), followed by Instagram ($801.1 million) and Facebook ($137.2 million). Instagram led in ad revenue from users aged 13-17 ($4 billion), followed by TikTok ($2 billion) and YouTube ($1.2 billion). The study also estimates that Snapchat derived the largest share of its overall 2022 ad revenue from users under 18 (41%), followed by TikTok (35%), YouTube (27%), and Instagram (16%).

The researchers argued that the results underscore a critical necessity for government intervention in social media regulation. The failure of these platforms to implement meaningful self-regulation poses significant concerns, especially considering the financial incentives tied to children using their services.

Bryn Austin, a professor in the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at Harvard and a senior author on the study, emphasized, "Although social media platforms may claim that they can self-regulate their practices to reduce the harms to young people, they have yet to do so, and our study suggests they have overwhelming financial incentives to continue to delay taking meaningful steps to protect children."