Australia’s Social Media Ban: Is it Enough to Protect Children? 

As the Australian social media ban for under 16-year-olds takes effect today, it’s time to look at the worldwide impact of this unprecedented move to protect the mental health of children. What is the ban? What is the scientific evidence? How have other countries responded? What are the take-home messages for us now? And is it enough to prevent younger teens from getting access to social media accounts? More importantly, what can parents do?

Australia's New Social Media Law

Australia’s Online Safety Amendment Act took effect on December 10, 2024. It’s a ban on children under age 16 getting social media accounts. Under the law, the platforms themselves will carry the responsibility of ensuring age-compliance, not the children or parents. Parents cannot give consent for their child to hold the accounts. Children may still read material on the platforms, but not hold the accounts needed to post, comment, or interact. Facebook, YouTube, Reddit, Snapchat, Instagram, X, and Tik Tok are included in this ban. More may be added. Platforms will need to use a secure, multi-layered approach to prevent children getting around the restriction. Penalties of up to $50 million apply.  

The Evidence: Social Media and Children

The Australian government has taken this unprecedented step as a response to the understanding of the evidence, including what was outlined in an IFS post last year. The evidence is not only that excessive social media and screen use is harmful to children, but that it is designed to be addictive. This addictive quality makes it difficult for children to ”just say no,” or for parents to simply lay down the law of the household. The Australian government is making it the law of the land to help parent and children overcome an addictive threat to mental health. The recent UK Youth Poll of 2000 16 to 29-year-olds shows that two-thirds of young people think a ban is a good idea.

The bulk of mental health care workers, including psychiatrists like myself, agree with the evidence: that excessive social media and screen use have significantly contributed to the rapid alarming increase in youth suicide, and to the rapid alarming decline in child and adolescent mental health; particularly since the release of smartphones.

The bulk of mental health care experts, including psychiatrists like myself, agree that excessive social media and screen use have significantly contributed to the alarming increase in youth suicide, and the alarming decline in child mental well-being.

Around the World: Government Regulations

In September, several regions in Japan, including the town of Toyoake, introduced ordinances limiting smart phone use to two hours daily for all residents. Transgressing this carries no conviction or fine. So what’s the point? Messaging. The ordinances send a strong message to all that society considers these things to be harmful and contrary to societal values. This encourages parents to guide their children and say something like because it’s harmful and against our laws, we don’t do it. This carries the weight of society’s accepted values.

But more happened globally in 2025 in this vital area.

In October 2025, the government of Denmark announced a plan to ban under 15 year olds from major social platforms. The Netherlands enacted guidelines for parents on social media this past June, and Norway has also considered something similar. Based on their understanding of the evidence, the French government is considering a ban for under 15-year-olds together with a “digital curfew” to protect sleep. The UK government has introduced added protections for under 18-year-olds, and 97% of schools are banning or controlling smartphones in some way. Spain is pushing the European Union to consider tougher restrictions for children, and South Korea has enacted a nation-wide ban on smartphones in schools. 

It's a growing trend: countries around the world are looking at what can be done legislatively to help protect children from the known harms of social media and screen addiction. These efforts are based on the scientific evidence on social media's negative effects on children's development. Soft and medium evidence rather than hard, some researchers argue. But how much evidence do we need to enact laws to help protect our children?

Will the U.S. Follow Australia's Example?

In the United States, on this issue at least, the emphasis is more on what states can do—at least for now. From late 2024, several states enacted social media protection laws, including age verification, the need for parental consent, or the restricting of certain online features. California, for instance, enacted the Protecting our kinds from social media addiction act (SB-976). Among other things, this act prohibits platforms from swamping children with addictive feeds. Nebraska enacted the Parental rights in social media act (LB 383) in May; and other protective laws were enacted in Virginia (a statewide ban on. cell phone use in schools, for example), Louisiana, Utah, and Oregon. During 2025, laws were proposed but blocked in several other states.

This is a large social experiment to protect our children. But laws cannot replace values—or parental involvement.

At the federal level, the GUARD Act, which IFS recently covered, was introduced in the Senate and would protect children from predator AI chatbots. And what has appened to the federal Kids’ Online Safety Act (KOSA)? This bill, introduced in 2022, aimed to impose a duty of care on platforms to protect minors from harms on social media. After the frenzy of initial debate, it was passed in the Senate by a wide bipartisan majority, but since then, KOSA has stalled. Recently, the Energy and Commerce Committee in the House of Representatives included KOSA in a larger child safety package. This renewed interest in KOSA is encouraging, but the duty of care is not in the House version, making some critics worry that it needs to be stronger. Hence, the flurry of state activity.

In the U.S., the status of social media use by children has become a legal watch this space area. But please, watch this space in real life, not online.

Is the Ban Enough?

Our children are clever. Teens have reportedly already found ways around the ban, according to the BBC. So, is it enough? Not by a long shot. Laws cannot replace values—or parental involvement. To that end, here are seven things parents can do to keep children protected online.

1. Accept that the law is never enough, be it for social media, alcohol, or vaping. It’s values and role modeling that will make the big difference in a child’s life.
2. Model responsible screen behavior: walk the walk as well as talk the talk.
3. Build digital literacy rather than digital fear. Age-appropriately, prepare your child for a world of social media, and all the harm that can come with it. Let them know what to look out for in algorithms, manipulation, and click-bait.
4. Keep communication open and shame free. Talk, talk, talk. This is an opportunity to discuss digital entertainment and values. The aim is to build resilience. 
5. Have together-online time, and play together. Learn digital language and how to spot the risks together. Value together time on their terms.
6. Use content-restricting apps. Negotiate the times and sites allowed. Say we are doing this because we love you too much.
7. Value family meals, sleep, exercise, outdoor time, chores, and excursions over screen time. If these are more fun and are valued more than being online, what chance do online influencers have to manipulate your child?

A Growing Awareness

In 2025, we've seen an increasing worldwide trend towards laws protecting children from the harms of social media addiction and excessive screen use. This has extended into bans on smartphones, especially in schools. Australia is leading from the front in this effort. This positive trend represents a growing global awareness of the need to better protect children and families online, and for building stronger family values around technology use. Scientifically, we wait to see the results.

But what will governments, researchers, teachers, and parents be looking for? Governments around the world will be looking for the commercial and political impact of the ban, researchers will be looking for measurable improvements in the mental health of the young, teachers will be looking for better social and academic performance at school, and parents will be happy if their children are enjoying life more. 

This is a large social experiment to protect our children. Many children will be forced to abstain from social media use after using it excessively for years. It’s an opportunity for some keen researchers with a very large grant to start a powerful randomized control trial. Here in Australia, this research has already begun. But for most of us, it is an opportunity to reset our values.

At the moment, young people are living secondhand lives in very small worlds on phones in their bedrooms. We concerned clinicians see this stealing childhoods, self-worth, and mental health. Our world is full of wonderful sights, opportunities, and In Real Life (IRL) relationships. It’s expansive, not reductive. Are researchers poised to capture the data that could once more expand our children’s horizons? I hope so. 

Whatever we’re looking for from Australia’s child-protecting ban and the larger global effort—whether that be definitive evidence, better school achievement, or happier children—we should keep our eyes on the science and on the children we love, not on screens. The soft-to-medium evidence says that way, we’ll enjoy life just a little more. 

Dr. Christian Heim is a clinical psychiatrist and Senior Lecturer at The University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia.

*Photo credit: Shutterstock