{"id":707761,"date":"2026-01-20T03:24:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-20T03:24:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/707761\/"},"modified":"2026-01-20T03:24:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T03:24:11","slug":"uk-to-consider-australia-style-ban-on-social-media-for-children-social-media-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/707761\/","title":{"rendered":"UK to consider Australia-style ban on social media for children | Social Media News"},"content":{"rendered":"

UK ministers will visit Australia to gather information on the first-ever social media ban for under-16s implemented last month.<\/p>\n

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Published On 20 Jan 202620 Jan 2026<\/p>\n

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The UK government has launched a consultation on implementing an Australian-style social media ban<\/a> for children in the UK, as well as other measures to better protect minors online.<\/p>\n

The government said on Monday it would examine evidence from around the world<\/a> on a wide range of suggested proposals, including looking at \u200cwhether a social media ban for minors would be effective, and if one \u200cwas introduced, how best to \u200cmake it work.<\/p>\n

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UK ministers will \u2060visit Australia, which last month became the first country in the world to ban social media for young people \u200cunder 16 years old, hoping to learn firsthand from the Australian approach<\/a>, the UK government said in a \u200dstatement.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe consultation will look at options including raising the digital age of consent, implementing phone curfews to avoid excessive use, and restricting potentially addictive design features such as \u2018streaks\u2019 and \u2018infinite scrolling\u2019,\u201d the government said.<\/p>\n

The UK\u2019s announcement comes as governments and regulators worldwide grapple with the rapid explosion of AI-generated content, which was highlighted this month by an international outcry over reports of Elon Musk\u2019s Grok AI chatbot<\/a> generating non-consensual sexual images, including of children.<\/p>\n

The UK has already set out plans for an outright ban on artificial intelligence nudification tools<\/a>, while working to stop children being able \u200cto take, share or view nude images on their devices, \u2060it said in Monday\u2019s statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are determined to ensure technology enriches children\u2019s lives, not harms them \u2013 and to give every child the childhood they deserve,\u201d UK Secretary of State for Technology Liz Kendall said.<\/p>\n

The UK\u2019s announcement did not mention a particular age limit for social media use, but the statement said it was exploring a ban \u201cfor children under a certain age\u201d, in addition to other measures, such as better age checks and looking into whether the current digital age of consent of 13 years was too low.<\/p>\n

The leader of the opposition Conservative Party, Kemi Badenoch, has already said her party would introduce a social media ban for under-16s if it were in power, the UK\u2019s PA Media news agency reports.<\/p>\n

Badenoch, PA reports, said the planned consultation by the Labour-led government of Prime Minister Keir Starmer amounted to more delay from his leadership, after earlier accusing him of lacking the \u201cbackbone\u201d to enforce a social media ban.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe prime minister is trying to copy an announcement that the Conservatives made a week ago, and still not getting it right,\u201d Badenoch said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is yet more dither and delay from Starmer and a Labour Party that have entirely run out of ideas.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"UK ministers will visit Australia to gather information on the first-ever social media ban for under-16s implemented last…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":707762,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[11410,186,748,78611,393,299,4884,3082,12,1144,712,182,16,15,1764],"class_list":{"0":"post-707761","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uk","8":"category-united-kingdom","9":"tag-asia-pacific","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-britain","12":"tag-child-rights","13":"tag-england","14":"tag-europe","15":"tag-great-britain","16":"tag-internet","17":"tag-news","18":"tag-northern-ireland","19":"tag-scotland","20":"tag-social-media","21":"tag-uk","22":"tag-united-kingdom","23":"tag-wales"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115925294733718797","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/707761","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=707761"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/707761\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/707762"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=707761"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=707761"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=707761"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}