Australia bans social media for under-16s

The Australian Senate approved a bill on Thursday which notably provides for a ban on the use of social networks by under 16 years old. This is the last step for the oceanic country to become the first nation in the world to impose this restrictive measure intended to improve the psychological and social well-being of the little ones.

The measure enjoys the support of the country’s main parties. The parties managed to move the process forward before the start of the parliamentary recess. Some legislators have nevertheless expressed doubts about this reform. It also had the support of the House of Representatives, which already voted for it on Wednesday. Once approved, it will come into effect within one year.

The text proposes fines of up to 50 million Australian dollars, which would be equivalent to around 30.8 million euros for companies that do not respect this new age limit. In any case, it has not yet been specified which networks or platforms will be affected. What the Executive has already ruled out are sanctions for users who violate this law.

Despite this, the platforms that should be affected by this new ban have already spoken out against the rule due to its lack of specificity. The social network X, formerly Twitter, owned by the North American tycoon Elon Muskassured that the measure aims to control access to the Internet for all Australian citizens “through the back door”.

For his part, Antoine AlbanaisAustralian Prime Minister, was the first to explain the benefits of this ban. The Australian leader stressed that this is an unprecedented reform in the world. “Social media is hurting our children and I am going to put a stop to it. “I want Australian parents and families to know that the government supports them,” he said of the changes.

Support in Spain

According to the V Macro-study on gender violence “Zero Tolerance”, carried out for the fifth consecutive year by the Mutua Madrileña Foundation, carried out in October this year with more than 6,000 people, 70% of the Spanish population is in favor of install parental controls on navigation devices, a percentage which decreases to 47% among young people between 16 and 21 years old and rises to 83% among those over 55 years old. In addition, 78% are in favor of the digital passport and sees it as an effective measure so that minors do not have access to pornography.

Precisely, among the reasons that can explain why among young people there seems to be greater permissiveness with regard to gender violence, 57% believe that it is because of easy access for minors to sexual content which distort reality and 49% blame her on social media and messages of the Internet.

About the measures that could be more effective so that young people are more aware of gender-based violence, 51% choose to create a topic or include content specialties in the educational program, followed by limit daily browsing time on social networks for minors (41%)of delay access mobile phones among children (41%) and prohibit minors from accessing cell phones in schools (27%).