Overview
- Preliminary eSafety figures show 4.7 million under-16 accounts have been deactivated or deleted across major platforms since the December 10 rollout.
- The eSafety Commissioner is analyzing company data to gauge individual platform compliance, and the government reports more than one million visits to its education site since October.
- The law requires age verification steps such as facial estimation or ID checks and threatens fines up to A$49.5 million for failures to take reasonable steps.
- Tech firms are responding unevenly, with Meta saying it blocked over 500,000 under-16 accounts and urging app-store age checks, while Reddit has mounted a legal challenge.
- Authorities are confronting workarounds and app shifts, prompting Lemon8 to adopt restrictions after self-assessment, as policymakers in the U.K., Denmark, Norway, France, and Spain explore similar measures.