Big tech must introduce age checks to support UK’s under-16s social media ban

UK to take restrictions further than Australia

The UK’s ban follows a similar move by Australia, which introduced an outright social media ban for children in December 2025.

Starmer said the UK would go further by taking action to ensure that livestreaming platforms and the ability of strangers to communicate with children on gaming platforms are turned off by default for under-16s and 17-year-olds.

The ban will prevent AI chatbots from offering sexually explicit content to under-18s, and there will also be restrictions for under-18s accessing “romantic companion chatbots”.

The government said it would publish details of plans for overnight curfews and breaks in infinite scrolling for under-18s in July. 

Speaking at Downing Street this morning, the prime minister said that because of the government’s experience with the Online Safety Act, which has been used to restrict access by children to adult sites, it has an “understanding of how to apply age verification technology”.

Powers introduced in the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Act, which became law in April, mean the government can “move at pace” and adapt as technology changes.

Starmer said he hoped to pass the regulation before Christmas and bring the ban into force by spring 2027. “We have these powers, so we are ready and confident that this ban can be effective now,” he said.

No contradiction between ban and supporting big tech

Starmer said that there was no contradiction between supporting big tech and protecting children.

“When I look at the brilliance of the innovators in AI and tech, I know very well that it is possible to do both. The innovation is incredible. Don’t tell me that it’s impossible for those innovators, those people who are brilliant at technology, to devise ways to protect our children,” he said.

Don’t tell me that it’s impossible for those innovators, those people who are brilliant at technology, to devise ways to protect our children

The prime minister said success could be measured by a drop in the number of children using social media. But equally and perhaps more important is creating a “cultural change” that would see children having more “enriched childhoods”.

Starmer said he would discuss the ban with US president Donald Trump, who has expressed opposition to UK restrictions on big tech companies.

“I honestly think that across world leaders, there has always been a recognition that leaders have to take steps to protect children. I don’t think that’s controversial. There will also be arguments as to exactly what the limits of that are and what rules should be in place, but I don’t see that as a problem,” he said.

Delivering effective age verification

The government said it would learn lessons from Australia’s experience by introducing more highly effective age assurance (HEAA) measures to support compliance, making it far harder for children to bypass safeguards. 

In a letter to Ofcom, published today, Liz Kendall, secretary of state for science, innovation and technology, asked the regulator to conduct a “rapid assessment” of what “highly effective age assurance” would look like and to assess what new methods could support age verification in the future by October. She said that she had asked Ofcom to prioritise data privacy and security.

The prime minister did not say whether the government intended to ban under-16s from accessing virtual private networks (VPNs), which could be used to circumvent age verification.

Today’s announcement follows a government consultation that received 116,000 responses from parents, children and experts. Downing Street said the responses showed overwhelming public backing for tougher action, with nine in 10 parents saying they would support a social media ban for children under 16.

Platforms with built-in safeguards for children, including YouTube Kids, Lego Play and Google Classroom, will fall outside the ban, said Starmer.

Concerns over mandatory age verification

The Foundation for Information Policy Research (FIPR), a technology think tank, last week raised “deep concerns” that mandatory age verification could expose children to greater risk of harm.

“While it is tempting to rely on ‘magic’ technological fixes for online harm, these will not work, will concentrate even more power in the hands of large tech platforms, and will risk letting them off the hook for the wider social harms to which they contribute,” Ben Collier, FIPR chair and senior lecturer at the University of Edinburgh, told Computer Weekly.

The Open Rights Group (ORG), a campaign group for digital rights and privacy, said the UK government had failed to address the root cause of online harm – the promotion of harmful content by algorithms.

ORG spokesperson James Baker said widespread requirements for age verification to use internet-based services would put children and adults at risk of hacking and security breaches.

It emerged last year that government ID photos of about 70,000 global users of the chat platform Discord, used by video gamers, may have been exposed after hackers compromised a company contracted to carry out age verification checks.

“Soon, it will be virtually impossible to be online in the UK without handing over identity documents or biometric data to unregulated companies,” said Baker.

Evidence from Australia shows age bans don’t keep children off social media; they just remove the safety measures platforms put in place for them

Pro-privacy campaign group Big Brother Watch said that the British people had always rejected mandatory ID schemes, but now they would be required to verify their identity to use web services.

“These proposals will force the public to trust their IDs to companies with serious track records of leaks and hacks,” said head of advocacy Jack Coulson. “Evidence from Australia shows age bans don’t keep children off social media; they just remove the safety measures platforms put in place for them,” he added.

Law firm Simkins LLP said the proposed age verification measures raise data protection concerns when children’s data is processed.

“From a user perspective, there is also a real risk that a blanket ban may push under-16s towards less regulated platforms (and potentially less controlled content), thereby undermining its intended effect,” said Simkins associate Stephen Cartwright.

Amnesty International said the ban risks treating children as the problem rather than addressing the platforms and business models that create online harms.

“The problem is not that children exist on social media; it’s that social media companies have built platforms that are unsafe by design,” said Kerry Moscogiuri, chief executive of Amnesty International UK.

Age verification ‘technically achievable’

The Age Verification Providers Association (AVPA), which represents age verification services, said the government’s aims were “technically achievable using technology that is already widely deployed”.

The association said that VPNs were not an insurmountable obstacle to enforcing age verification, as platforms can use additional geolocation, device and behavioural indicators to assess whether a user is likely to be accessing a service from the UK.

“The debate has moved beyond whether online age assurance works. The technology already exists and is being used successfully every day at enormous scale,” said Iain Corby, executive director at the AVPA.