Science1 publisher3 min readPublished
One in five Australian under-16s stayed on TikTok and Snapchat after the national ban
One in five Australian under-16s still used TikTok and Snapchat after 4.7 million accounts were restricted, according to a parental-control firm. Other governments are copying the approach with no evidence yet that it makes children safer.
The Scientist · Science desk
What happened
- Within weeks of Australia's under-16 ban, the eSafety Commissioner reported that platforms had restricted access to 4.7 million under-16 accounts.
- About two months after that report, an unnamed parental-control data company found one in five Australian under-16s still using TikTok and Snapchat.
- Indonesia's child safety framework took effect in March, barring children under 16 from holding accounts on platforms it classes as high-risk.
- On 17 September the European Commission proposed the EU KIDS Act, barring under-13s and setting 15 as the minimum age for opening an account independently.
Compiled by The ScientistSomething wrong?How this is made
Why it matters
- constraint One Australian figure counts accounts and the other counts teenagers, so other governments cannot plan around a compliance rate that Australia's early results do not produce.
- exposure Every appeal against a wrong age flag that runs through ID and selfies adds identity data to a platform's records, with open doubt over whether regulators will police its handling.
- constraint Where regulators lack staff and skills, enforcement of an age ban rests on compliance figures the platforms report about themselves.
- decision Governments setting a cutoff somewhere between 13 and 16 are choosing without harm-outcome data, so the ages reflect policy judgement more than a measured effect.
The 4.7 million counts accounts [1]. The one in five counts teenagers, measured about two months later [2]. Accounts and children are different units, and the tools that sort one from the other are imperfect. Facial age estimation is probabilistic and has been shown to misclassify adults as well as children [15]. The two figures cannot be combined into a compliance rate for the ban.
The second figure has gaps of its own. The IEEE Spectrum essay that reports it does not name the company, describe its sample or give a usage rate from before the ban [2]. Without a baseline, one in five fits a large fall in use or a small one.
Neither number measures whether children are safer online. The essay's author has worked on Child Online Protection initiatives with the International Telecommunication Union across Southeast Asia and the Pacific, and writes that governments are moving ahead without answering that question [9][8]. "Instead, we should be paying more attention to the systems that generate harm in the first place," the author wrote, naming recommender algorithms, engagement-maximizing design, opaque moderation and extractive data practices [10][9].
Two of the new measures do regulate design. The UK would extend child-safety rules to cover risky AI features [6]. The EU KIDS Act would require platforms to show that their services are age-appropriate and safe by design [7]. The core of each package is still an age cutoff, and the cutoffs differ. Across Australia, France, Indonesia, the UK and the EU proposal, minimum ages run from 13 to 16 [16]. France set 15 when it approved its law in January [3]. Before that vote, a 13-year-old named Benjamin described what he expected to lose. "If we want to play football, we won't be able to organize it. What will we do? Send letters instead?" he told Le Monde [4].
Indonesia shows the enforcement side. Platforms carry out age verification and report their own compliance, while the Ministry of Communication and Digital Affairs oversees them [13]. A 2026 UNICEF evaluation found capacity constraints among service providers, uncertain long-term funding and a need for specialized personnel [11]. Some local staff lacked digital skills, and budget limits left some areas relying on external support [11]. TikTok's appeals process for users flagged as underage can require a government-issued ID and selfies, collecting data from the card beyond what confirming an age needs [14].
The author's own research on Indonesia, published this year in Digital Society, found that many children lacked guidance on navigating the internet safely [12]. Large numbers did not know how to report harmful experiences, gaps the author argues account removals cannot repair [12].
I would treat the 4.7 million as a record of platform enforcement activity [1]. Answering whether a ban protects children would take a population sample, a pre-ban baseline and an outcome measured in harm to children.
What to watch
- Whether Australia's eSafety Commissioner publishes measures of teen usage or harm beyond counts of restricted accounts.
- Whether the parental-control company behind the one-in-five figure is named and its sample and pre-ban baseline disclosed.
- How the EU KIDS Act defines 'safe by design' as it moves beyond the Commission's proposal.