Australia To Ban Social Media For Children, Age-Verification Trial Concludes

Canberra: Australia is preparing to become the first nation globally to impose a nationwide ban on social media use for children under 16. A major government-backed trial found that age verification technology can work effectively and privately, paving the way for the potential ban.

The Age Assurance Technology trial, involving over 1,000 school students and hundreds of adults, tested how accurately existing tools could verify a user's age without excessive collection of personal information. The UK-based NGO Age Check Certification Scheme (ACCS) oversaw the trial. The results are seen as a significant step towards realizing Australia's proposed legislation.

ACCS CEO Tony Allen stated there are no significant technical barriers to age assurance in Australia. While acknowledging no system is perfect, Allen affirmed that age verification can be done privately, efficiently, and effectively in Australia. Further attention will be given to some tools potentially collecting more data than necessary. The current testing model is a multi-layered approach, starting with traditional ID-based checks using documents like passports or driver's licenses.

These are verified through independent systems, and platforms cannot directly access the documents. Biometric estimation is another step, where users can upload a selfie or short video, which AI uses to estimate age. This method is quick and doesn't collect biometric data. The third component is contextual inference, which further estimates user age from behaviors like email type, language, and digital behavior.

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