Facebook and Instagram’s parent company Meta announced on Thursday (August 13) that they have closed over 756,000 accounts suspected to belong to underage users in Australia since the implementation of the “Social Media Under 16 Account Restriction Order”.
According to the data released by Meta, approximately 462,000 of the accounts belonged to Instagram, while 294,000 were Facebook accounts. The number of banned accounts has significantly increased compared to the 331,000 Instagram accounts and 173,000 Facebook accounts reported in January this year.
Meta stated that they are continuously enforcing the relevant regulations, and the number of bans is expected to further increase in the future.
In 2024, the Australian Federal Parliament passed a landmark social media minimum age law, which was officially implemented on December 10, 2025. This legislation requires platforms to take concrete measures to prevent individuals under the age of 16 from having social media accounts. The Australian government stated that the law aims to reduce the negative impact of social media on the physical and mental health of children and adolescents.
Despite platforms like Meta, TikTok, and Google openly opposing this law, Meta recently declared that the company is fulfilling its legal obligations to ensure that teenagers have a safe and age-appropriate online experience.
However, official Australian data and several independent studies have shown that in the three months following the implementation of the ban, over 80% of teenagers under 16 continued to use social media.
The Australian government has criticized some platforms for not actively implementing the new regulations and even deliberately creating obstacles that hinder enforcement. Currently, Australia has amended the law to increase the maximum fine for violations to 99 million Australian dollars (approximately 69.8 million US dollars) and has granted regulatory authorities greater investigative and evidentiary powers.
Meta stated that the company utilizes artificial intelligence (AI) technology to analyze “contextual clues” in user data, such as birthday celebrations, school grade information, and user reports, to identify suspected users under 16. Additionally, for accounts banned due to underage violations, the company has implemented an intercept mechanism to prevent them from repeatedly attempting to re-register and circumvent regulation.
According to a report on age verification technology testing completed by the Australian government, although related technologies in the market (such as facial age estimation) have been proven feasible, there are limitations in accurately determining the age in critical age ranges.
Large platforms including Meta have begun deploying photo-based age estimation technologies, typically inferring age based on users’ online activity characteristics and then deciding whether to trigger mandatory age verification.
It is reported that the Australian Federal Parliament will hold a hearing on underage social media ban on August 14. Representatives from Meta, TikTok, YouTube under Google, and Snapchat under Snap, along with regulatory agencies and government officials, will attend to explain the implementation of the ban and follow-up measures.
As of now, other major social platforms have not yet released execution data for the same statistical period as Meta.
(This article is based on a report from Reuters)