Australia Regulator and YouTube Spar Over Under-16s Social Media Ban 18
Australia's eSafety Commissioner has urged the government to deny YouTube an exemption from upcoming child safety regulations, citing research showing it exposes more children to harmful content than any other platform. YouTube pushed back, calling the commissioner's stance inconsistent with government data and parental feedback. "The quarrel adds an element of uncertainty to the December rollout of a law being watched by governments and tech leaders around the world as Australia seeks to become the first country to fine social media firms if they fail to block users aged under 16," reports Reuters. From the report: The centre-left Labor government of Anthony Albanese has previously said it would give YouTube a waiver, citing the platform's use for education and health. Other social media companies such as Meta's Facebook and Instagram, Snapchat, and TikTok have argued such an exemption would be unfair. eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant said she wrote to the government last week to say there should be no exemptions when the law takes effect. She added that the regulator's research found 37% of children aged 10 to 15 reported seeing harmful content on YouTube -- the most of any social media site. [...]
YouTube, in a blog post, accused Inman Grant of giving inconsistent and contradictory advice, which discounted the government's own research which found 69% of parents considered the video platform suitable for people under 15. "The eSafety commissioner chose to ignore this data, the decision of the Australian Government and other clear evidence from teachers and parents that YouTube is suitable for younger users," wrote Rachel Lord, YouTube's public policy manager for Australia and New Zealand.
Inman Grant, asked about surveys supporting a YouTube exemption, said she was more concerned "about the safety of children and that's always going to surpass any concerns I have about politics or being liked or bringing the public onside". A spokesperson for Communications Minister Anika Wells said the minister was considering the online regulator's advice and her "top priority is making sure the draft rules fulfil the objective of the Act and protect children from the harms of social media."
YouTube, in a blog post, accused Inman Grant of giving inconsistent and contradictory advice, which discounted the government's own research which found 69% of parents considered the video platform suitable for people under 15. "The eSafety commissioner chose to ignore this data, the decision of the Australian Government and other clear evidence from teachers and parents that YouTube is suitable for younger users," wrote Rachel Lord, YouTube's public policy manager for Australia and New Zealand.
Inman Grant, asked about surveys supporting a YouTube exemption, said she was more concerned "about the safety of children and that's always going to surpass any concerns I have about politics or being liked or bringing the public onside". A spokesperson for Communications Minister Anika Wells said the minister was considering the online regulator's advice and her "top priority is making sure the draft rules fulfil the objective of the Act and protect children from the harms of social media."
Exemptinkg YouTube is nonsense (Score:5, Insightful)
Look - if you're going to roll out these wacky laws, then you need to think through the implementation, do it consistently, and live with the consequences.
The idea that YouTube should be granted an exemption over TikTok and Instagram simply because some of their content is educational, is *BANANAS*. Are you trying to tell me there is no educational videos on Instagram and TikTok?
The regulations, and any exemptions, should be based on clearly defined CONTENT RULES, *NOT* based on platforms. IE, if you want to exempt educational videos, then exempt them outright and let all platforms allow minors to view that type of content.
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More fundamentally - ALL LAWS need to be enforced.
To do otherwise completely undermines democracy. It amounts to the prosecutors office or 'director of ...' picking winners and losers. Prosecuting people and organizations they don't like while looking the other way for others, and hiding their arbitrary and capricious activity under a false cover of 'discretion' for reasons of resources.
That gives way rapidly to the absolutely heinous situations where officials proudly flaunt their civic duties to effect s
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We're saying the same thing.
Laws should never pick winners and losers. If you want to police content, then define how the content should be policed, and then go and do that. Don't make up arbitrary lists of companies - which, by the way, will become outdated the moment they are published.
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You are asking politicians to make sane laws based on facts and not primarily designed for publicity effects. Do you get how insane that is?
No child under 16 (Score:2)
No child under 16 should be exposed to youtube comments.
If you create an exception for youtube, you might as well not bother. A youtube carve out is completely unjustifiable.
Dangerous territory (Score:2)
I think we are getting into dangerous territory here. For many people, youtube has replaced or taken a share of traditional TV. It's a standard app on most if not all smart TVs. Requiring this age check would mean you need to make an account and then provide private details, yet your kids can still watch it. The only way to ensure nobody under 16 watches youtube is to introduce more surveillance (biometric checks when the app is started, periodic checks while watching), restrictions and privacy intrusions -
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And who gets to decide what's blatantly harmful? Some people think information about breast cancer is harmful. Should you be in control? What makes you qualified to be censor of everyone?
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There are plenty of tools out there to let parents make these kinds of decisions for their own children.
As it is, I've had to lie about my kids ages on several accounts because they were too locked down otherwise. I'm watching what they do (oh god please no more skibidi).
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Problem is most parents are painfully unaware, and then let their children down by taking no action. Kids are getting groomed online, and we can’t just say “well parents should take better care”..are we ok with larger and larger segments of our society falling apart because the current generation doesn’t understand technology?
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It's no conspiracy, the politicians are just that stupid.
Their preferred method of age verification is face scanning ... the biggest privacy invasion by social media to date, by government mandate.
15-years-old "children"? (Score:2)
15-years-old are children? What kind of nonsense is this?
I understand wanting to prevent actual children, that is, those up to 11-years-old, from watching unvetted content. And providing a transition period on a curve once someone leaves childhood at 12 years of age and becomes a pre-teen, then a teen at 14.
But calling those in the 12-to-15 bracket "children" is an utter and complete absurd!
Re:15-years-old "children"? (Score:5, Insightful)
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If that's the case, then the way (W)estern, (E)ducated, (I)ndustrialized, (R)ich, and (D)emocratic countries raise their real children into becoming merely older children has hit an all-time low. Or high, depending on how one looks at it.
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But calling those in the 12-to-15 bracket "children" is an utter and complete absurd!
I completely agree. These people are not children. They are not yet fully adult in modern society (they used to be in medeival society, for example) either, but they need to be able to take some responsibility and see some facettes of reality.
The "cult of the child" is however strong in some societies and that causes a lot of stupid things.
Age "verification" (Score:2)
Instead of just offering a government service for age verification based on government issued physical ID with NFC or phone bound ID's, they just throw their hands up in the air and tell the social media companies to figure something out ... oh and they can't demand physical ID either.
Making pigs fly is easier than doing age verification within the rules set by the Australian government.