Communications Minister Anika Wells includes YouTube in under-16s social media ban

Federal Communications Minister Anika Wells discusses the Australian government’s decision to include YouTube in the social media ban for under 16s.

Transcript

00:00Fresh evidence from the eSafety Commissioner that 37% of kids had their most recent or

00:08most impactful online harm at the hands of YouTube.

00:12So that is evidence that I can't ignore and they are joining the band.

00:16YouTube Kids doesn't qualify for the laws because it doesn't have the ability to upload

00:20videos and it doesn't have the ability to make comments on videos.

00:24And I think we can all agree, like you say, social media has its place.

00:27We use YouTube Kids when you need to occupy a child while you're working or whatever.

00:31But persuasive and predatory algorithms do not have a place and that's what we're cracking

00:37down on.

00:38And I want parents to know we have your backs.

00:40The onus here is on the platforms to uphold their social responsibility as a social media

00:45platform and come 10 December social media accounts held by under-16s must be deactivated.

00:52Platforms must deactivate them.

00:54They must take reasonable steps to make sure that they don't get reactivated or new accounts

00:58or workarounds because kids will find workarounds, God bless them, we know that they will.

01:03Platforms must take reasonable steps to try and stop that from happening.

01:07If you are in a logged out state, YouTube says that you don't see age-restricted content.

01:11So if it is unsafe in a logged out state, that is a social responsibility upon YouTube to

01:17fix that, just in the general sense, I would argue.

01:20But this is about the chilling effect.

01:21I mean, there's another survey that asks kids who are north of 16, do they wish that they'd

01:26gotten on social media later or had a delayed start?

01:30And they all say, yes, we do.

01:32But when everybody's on it and you're not, that's really isolating.

01:35So what this is, is a chilling effect.

01:37You're not on it.

01:38It's the law.

01:39And, you know, we'd prefer you to be outside playing sport or something.

01:42But your kids, your friends aren't on it, so you're not missing out.

01:45They're not missing out.

01:53They're almost missing out.

01:57They're not missing out.

01:59Can you realize that.

02:04We I don't know.