The federal government is looking to ban youngsters from social media. Photo: Shutterstock

The federal government will this week begin testing available online age verification technologies including facial recognition and move towards banning children from accessing social media by the end of the year.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese on Tuesday announced that legislation forcing social media companies and “other relevant digital platforms” to stop children under a specific age from accessing their services would go before Parliament by the end of the year.

The specific age range in question and how exactly social media firms will be required to verify the age of users is yet to be determined, with the next stage of the Communications Department’s trial of age verification technologies kicking off this week.

It comes just days after the South Australian government unveiled draft legislation that would place a positive obligation on social media companies to prevent children aged under 14 from accessing their services, and require parental consent for those aged 14 to 16.

This legislation is based on the findings of a report by former High Court Justice Robert French which was commissioned by the South Australian government.

Soon after SA’s announcement, the Victorian government announced that it too would be looking to implement a social media ban for children.

The federal government will now push for a national approach to the banning of children under a certain age from social media.

The South Australian approach involved placing the onus on the tech firms to verify the age of their users and imposing significant fines if they do not take “reasonable” steps to do so.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the national approach would be influenced by this plan and the French report.

“We’re certainly prepared to muscle up against them and to take action as the national government, because they do have a social responsibility here,” Albanese said on the Today Show.

“These big multinational companies think they’re above all the people who provide the income for their massive profits that they undertake.

“But they do have a social responsibility.

“And that is something that we as a government are prepared to take on.”

Testing the waters

The third stage of the federal government’s online age verification trial has launched this week, with the Department now live-testing the different technologies that are currently available to verify the age of people online.

The trial will look at how to limit access to pornography and social media for children aged between 13 and 16.

The $6.5 million trial was funded in the May budget and is focusing on testing “age assurance technology” that can be used to prevent children from accessing age-restricted online content such as pornography.

Albanese confirmed on Tuesday that one such technology that would be trialled will be facial recognition tools to confirm the age of users.

“That is one of the things we will be trialling, but there is a range of technologies that we can use,” Albanese told Sunrise.

The trial is being led by the department and does not currently involve social media firms.

‘Immature but developing’ techs

The federal government, through its eSafety Commissioner, has been mulling potential tools for age verification online for several years now, but is yet to find any that are effective and privacy-preserving.

This is a similar problem that other nations looking to implement bans have encountered too, something that Albanese has acknowledged.

“This is a global issue that governments around the globe are trying to deal with,” Albanese told ABC News Breakfast on Tuesday morning.

“We know that it’s not simple and it’s not easy, otherwise governments would have responded before.”

The eSafety Commissioner provided an Age Verification Roadmap to the government last year, which said that existing age assurance technologies were “immature but developing” and there were significant issues around privacy and security.

The federal government said this report showed that “age assurance technologies cannot yet meet all these requirements” and that it “makes clear that a decision to mandate age assurance is not ready to be taken”.