Since December, the new social media legislation in Australia requires platforms such as Instagram, Snapchat, and YouTube to prohibit users under 16 from creating accounts. Operators are obligated to take “reasonable steps” to ensure compliance, with the government suggesting multiple methods for verifying users’ ages.
The ban has faced significant criticism, as studies indicate that many individuals under 16 are still able to access these platforms. In response, Australia doubled the maximum fines last month and issued warnings about potential legal action against tech giants that fail to comply.
A group of software testers who trialed age-verification software on over 1,000 Australians last year discovered that platforms did not request age verification on any of the 50 accounts they registered as 16 after the law came into effect, the researchers informed Reuters.
This previously unreported finding highlights a critical oversight: while the focus has primarily been on the accuracy of photo-based age-verification software, the initial vetting process— which estimates a user’s age range based on their general online behavior— does not seem to be identifying younger users for additional scrutiny.
”There should be a requirement to verify your age, and at no point were we asked to confirm our ages or utilize age-verification methods,” stated Andrew Hammond, director at the testing firm KJR, which conducted the initial trial in 2025.
All 50 test accounts remain active and are distributed across nine of the ten platforms subject to the age restrictions, which include Meta’s Instagram, Snap’s Snapchat, TikTok, and Alphabet’s YouTube, Hammond mentioned.
Some test accounts received advertisements for youth banking products, indicating the platform acknowledged the user’s age range, Hammond noted. One account registered on Elon Musk’s X claiming to be 16 was shown pornographic material, he added.
Although none of the platforms allow registrations from users declaring they are under 16, only one, the Australia-based live-streaming platform Kick, required age verification for account creation, the follow-up study revealed.
Snap and TikTok chose not to comment, while Google and X, owned by SpaceX, did not respond to inquiries for comment.
A Meta spokesperson remarked that Hammond’s shadow trial seemed inconsistent with the regulator’s guidelines, which advocate for escalating to formal age verification when behavioral indicators imply users may be underage or when an account is reported.
The spokesperson further noted that the dummy accounts were declared as older than the minimum age and it was unclear if they had “posted content or interacted in a manner typical of a genuine underage user.”
A spokesperson for Kick expressed that relying solely on age inference wouldn’t be practical since the platform is new and lacks adequate data to estimate user ages.
A representative for the eSafety commissioner conveyed that the regulator “remains confident that age-restricted platforms possess the technology and resources necessary to prevent Australian children under 16 from having accounts.”
The advocated strategy of increasingly stringent checks, “if implemented correctly, ensures there is no single point of failure,” the spokesperson added.
Critiques of the 2025 Trial
Following an initial assertion that Australia’s ban eliminated approximately 4.7 million suspected underage accounts within a month, the rollout has been mired in constant reports of non-compliance. By March, the government warned of potential enforcement lawsuits against five platforms and indicated last month that the maximum penalty would be doubled, accusing the platforms of setting the ban up for failure.
Nonetheless, the platforms asserted that they are adhering to the regulator’s guidance, which favors a low-friction vetting process initially. The platforms are prohibited from relying solely on government-issued identification due to privacy concerns.
Some advisors to Hammond’s original trial claimed they consistently warned that the process was compromised by the absence of tests for real-life circumvention, which includes under-16s providing false birthdates.
”We did want to address circumvention, but we were repeatedly informed that it wasn’t part of the actual trial,” commented Colm Gannon, CEO of the International Centre for Missing & Exploited Children in Australia, who consulted on the project.
”What we’re witnessing now is that circumvention has become the prevalent strategy among young users,” he added.
Amanda Third, a youth digital rights academic who advised the trial and is currently involved in a two-year regulatory study on the ban’s effects, noted that platforms were always expected to start by targeting accounts that self-declared as underage before progressing to age inference methods by mid-year.
”In the next set of data collected after this phase, we might see some more significant statistics,” she remarked.
