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ANDREW CLENNELL: On 10 December the world will change for millions of Australians when the Federal Government introduces a ban on under 16s using social media. Tens of thousands of parents will have to explain to their teenagers why their social media accounts have been shut down and the tech companies will face fines of up to $50 million if they don’t make a proper effort to instantly shut down the Instagram, Snapchat and Facebook accounts of their teenage customers. It is revolutionary stuff and shapes as a big story to come over the summer. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese even declared last week he wanted to encourage other countries to take up this ban when he addresses the UN General Assembly in September.
The Communications Minister, Anika Wells, joined me a short time ago and we began by discussing her announcement today of more access to the NBN for people in regional communities in a partnership with Amazon. But you’ll see here, we soon turn to the social media ban and the implementation of it. Social media companies won’t have to use facial recognition technology to put it in place, the Minister says. They can mine their own data to block the accounts of young people.
[Excerpt]
ANDREW CLENNELL: Anika Wells, thanks so much for your time. You’ve made an announcement this morning concerning faster and more reliable broadband through the NBN, a partnership with Amazon. Take us through that. I think it’s improving things for people in regional areas, but the NBN has some competition there with Starlink, doesn’t it?
ANIKA WELLS: Well, do you remember the originating purpose for the NBN Co was doing what the market could not, which was providing high speed, high quality broadband to every Australian. There are still some gaps out there. People in rural and remote Australia in particular don’t experience the kind of high-quality high-speed access that they need and deserve. So, today’s deal will provide 300,000 homes and businesses with quicker access and services to things like telehealth, real-time apps, online gaming, health, education services that they need and deserve where they live. And you know, the Prime Minister’s credo is no Australian left behind. Today’s deal is another important contribution to that.
ANDREW CLENNELL: So what areas will this affect?
ANIKA WELLS: So, this will be – the NBN Co will work with Amazon, Kuiper now on the rollout of this. But what NBN Co would tell you is there are 300,000 homes and businesses that will be able to experience quicker, higher quality NBN connection as a result of this. This is that LEOSat technology rolling out. So, at the moment, the latency with which you interact with your services online, this will be a quicker way for homes and businesses to get high quality services that allows them to run a regional business from their home or their business in remote Australia, allow your kids to get better, quicker access to educational services, telehealth, online gaming, as is their right. And we look forward to this rolling out broadly across the country.
ANDREW CLENNELL: Are you happy with the average internet speed of Australians? Do you have other plans to improve internet speeds?
ANIKA WELLS: Well, this is exactly- this is a major milestone on that journey to high quality, high-speed broadband. We’re on a redemption journey after the old coalition copper delayed things, cost a fortune. We’re still fixing that error. And you would have seen me in the parliament last week talking about the steps that we are taking to improve those services for another 600,000 more Australians this year as part of the second term Albanese Government agenda. Today’s deal with Amazon Kuiper is another really important step in that journey to make sure that everybody in Australia, no matter which postcode you are in, is not left behind.
ANDREW CLENNELL: Well, first time I’ve spoken to you in your new portfolio, and the opportunity to talk a bit about the social media ban for under 16s now. Day one of that is 10 December. What happens on day one?
ANIKA WELLS: Under the law the onus is on the platforms to make sure that they have identified any social media accounts that are held by under 16s and that on day one those social media accounts are deactivated. They’ve also got to take reasonable steps to make sure that no new accounts are activated, that anyone trying to get around the system, they’ve taken reasonable steps to try and stop that from happening and to clean up errors as we go because anything that’s world leading, anything that we’re trying to do, we’re trying a big swing, it’s going to look a bit messy on the way through. That’s certainly what I found in aged care reform, but this is too important not to do.
You would have seen last week in the parliament we had bereaved parents who did the very best that they could with their kids and that wasn’t enough. So, we are stepping up and supporting those parents to give them another weapon in the battle of kids using the internet safely.
ANDREW CLENNELL: So, a kid who’s 14 currently has an Instagram account. That account, your expectation would be that the social media companies would be able to identify that it’s a 14-year-old using it and shut it down. How do you expect them to identify it?
ANIKA WELLS: Well, these social media companies know nearly everything about us. They can target us with deadly accuracy when it comes to their advertising and when it comes to promoting their advertising for revenue streams. So, if they know where you are, what you’re doing, whom you do it with, at what time you do it, there’s a very good chance that they know how old you are. And by the same token, for people who are over 16, if you’ve had a Facebook account since 2009, Andrew, they know that you’re over 16 as well.
ANDREW CLENNELL: And what’s occurring with this age verification trial then? Because it seems like initially the plan was to have this sort of technology where I look at my phone and you can see what age I am. Is that not ready yet? What’s the report into that saying? And do you expect social media companies to be using that? We’ve had reports people have used it and it said they’re 15, 17 and in their 30s. What’s the latest on that?
ANIKA WELLS: So, the age assurance trial, we have yet to receive the final recommendations and the final report. When I do receive them, I will publish them so that everybody can have a look at that and see the same evidence that I’m looking at to work with the eSafety Commissioner on how this roll out. You would have seen that there has been encouraging steps the initial- there was some reporting a few weeks ago about the initial recommendations, but whilst we wait for the final recommendations, I’ll just say that it looks promising, but it will be- there will be an onus on social media platforms to take reasonable steps and to work with the eSafety Commissioner around that, and also that there will be $49.5 million penalties for anyone found to be systemically breaching those obligations.
ANDREW CLENNELL: Yeah, so, just on that, from 10 December, would you expect the social media companies to use that age assurance technology or could it be you’re relying on what you alluded to earlier which is them sort of mining all the data they have to say, look, this kid’s 14, shut him or her off?
ANIKA WELLS: Andrew I think it’s fair to say that this will look a little bit different for every different platform or app, and that’s their right. They have proprietary technology, they have the right to build their own apps and systems around meeting their legal obligations. You would have seen this last week, there was some discussion around social media platforms needing to provide an alternative to asking their users to upload photo identification. They will need to provide an alternative, so that’s not the only mode of establishing someone’s age. But again, this innovative space. Big tech is booming and meetings I’ve had with executives of platforms have been asking me, how do we build something that gives us what we need and gives you what you need under the law. And I look forward to continuing that work together.
ANDREW CLENNELL: So, you’re offering them this technology if they want it but otherwise they can find their own way of policing this. Is that the case?
ANIKA WELLS: Well they’ll need to satisfy the eSafety Commissioner that they have taken reasonable steps. And reasonable steps is a relatively common test under the law. I think, as you would have heard the Prime Minister say Andrew in the previous term, social platforms currently need to do that as a social responsibility. But we’re also committed to delivering the digital duty of care so that soon – once we do that, once we review the Online Safety Act and deliver a digital duty of care – they will have a legal responsibility to do that under the law as well.
ANDREW CLENNELL: When could you envisage – I mean, you talk about the fines up to 45 million, I think you said, I’ve read 50 million and the reasonable steps test – what…
ANIKA WELLS: 49.5 million.
ANDREW CLENNELL: …49.5, there you go. Close enough to 50, isn’t it? It’s a lot. What circumstance can you see where companies would be fined? Like, would it be a situation where they didn’t just have the odd under 16 on there but they had, as you said, systemically, like, thousands of them? Is that what we’re sort of looking at?
ANIKA WELLS: That’s right. A systemic breach where, I think, the eSafety Commissioner takes a view that they have not taken reasonable steps to uphold the Australian law. And I think that that’s reasonable. I mean, can I remind you, Andrew – I know you’ve got kids yourself – the current law says that kids should not hold social media accounts if they’re below 13.
So, we’re talking about moving that age from 13 to 16, giving kids 36 more months to build online resilience, for us to build up their education about navigating the internet safely, for them to forge their own connections, you know, in sports teams or social areas that they’re interested in, their own hobbies outside the internet. Given that the current age is 13, we’re talking about delaying that for 36 months to give kids every right to find out who they are before these platforms assume who they are.
ANDREW CLENNELL: Well, it’s funny you should mention it. One of my children turns 16 11 days after your ban comes in, so I assume she’ll welcome the date of the ban relatively. But how much of this is about a signal as opposed to actual enforcement – a vehicle for parents to be able to tell their kids, hey, that’s not legal until you’re 16?
ANIKA WELLS: That’s exactly right, Andrew. I think this is about the chilling effect that a national law, which is a world-leading law, will have on the culture of social media account usage in our kids. And, like you say, your daughter will turn 16 10 days after the ban comes into place. My kids are younger. They will have always experienced social media accounts as something that is only available to them after 16. It’s about changing that culture.
And in the same way that you can’t smoke until you’re 18 or you can’t drink until you’re 18 and there’s still kids who will smoke or drink before 18 because they want to, they’ll get around the laws. There will be these instances. Like, God bless them, that’s how kids are. But also, plenty of kids – I have heard from parents who are relieved about this – are not currently signing up for a social media account because they know that they’re going to be banned. Lots of law-abiding kids out there too.
But overall, we’re about changing the culture and we’re doing things to build up awareness and better safety for our kids online.
ANDREW CLENNELL: I see this as the difficulty though, this kind of roadblock of, you know, millions of Australian kids, probably, who have social media accounts under – certainly hundreds of thousands, who have them under 16, between say 13 and 16. And that’s going to be more difficult than, say, if you’ve got a six-year-old now and, you know, who’s never seen the thing. Would you acknowledge that?
ANIKA WELLS: Absolutely. We’ve been acknowledging that the whole time and we’re sort of working with not just parents, but teachers and principals, people who are influential on a child’s life during that time about how we support them through that process. But at the moment, if you are a parent and you’ve decided that your kid who’s 14 you don’t want them to have an Instagram account. At the moment, because all 14-year-olds are able to do that, you are making a choice that might make them feel socially isolated.
These laws will mean that nobody who is 14 meant to be on Instagram. It will have a cultural impact and it will mean that people and parents don’t face blame for socially isolating their children for trying to do what is demonstrably the safest thing for them, which is to keep them off social media until they’ve got more development, more resilience, more connection in their real life.
ANDREW CLENNELL: And what’s the latest on any legal action in the wings on this?
ANIKA WELLS: Nothing from what we discussed last week in the Parliament.
ANDREW CLENNELL: So, you’ve got a letter from Google, didn’t you? Is that correct? That that’s a suggestion they might take action, but that’s not occurring. Where are we at?
ANIKA WELLS: Well, that’s right. The last we had was a letter from Google saying that if we did remove their exemption they would be considering their next steps. They argued that under-16’s have an implied right to freedom of political communication under the Australian Constitution. We haven’t had anything further since we chose to remove the YouTube exemption last Wednesday. Sorry, I made the decision last Tuesday, we announced it last Wednesday.
ANDREW CLENNELL: I mean, that has been controversial. Why did the Government decide to include YouTube? Because it’s only a ban on having an account. Kids could actually look at YouTube for hours and hours without an account, right? So, what practical effect does it have?
ANIKA WELLS: It means that YouTube is being treated the same as all other social media platforms. It means that YouTube is not being treated differently to its peers as social media platforms. I mean, YouTube would argue that it’s a video streaming service, but YouTube also self-identified as a social media platform when working with the eSafety Commissioner on industry codes, which industry led in February earlier this year.
So, it’s about treating all social media platforms the same and it’s about upholding the spirit of the law. Which is that we want kids to be off learning to play netball or having a go at little athletics or doing something with their friends in people’s backyards, rather than on a social media account.
And like you said, there is a utility for social media. It has its place. There is no place for predatory algorithms, and removing the YouTube login is about those predatory algorithms that occur within a login, whilst noting that parents, teachers have utility for YouTube. You can still access Numberblocks on a link that your teacher sends home if your kid needs to do that for their homework. We’re trying to get the balance right here. It’s about balance.
ANDREW CLENNELL: Have you got any further plans in the, sort of, misinformation bill space? We’ve seen a rise in the deepfake stuff going on the internet, images of the PM announcing things he hasn’t announced, even Sky presenters saying things that aren’t true. What other action are you considering there?
ANIKA WELLS: Look, in terms of my priorities, absolutely we are working towards delivering the social media ban come 10 December. Everybody’s had 12 months’ notice and we’ve got four months to go. And I’m also working on our review of the Online Safety Act and delivering a digital duty of care. I think that’s an important next step on the road to online safety and making the internet as safe as we possibly can for all of its users.
ANDREW CLENNELL: And finally, on the Peter Murphy gambling reforms, these really seem to have been shelved – a limit on ads to two an hour, for example, and around football matches. Will you be revisiting that proposal? Do you think – is it possible age assurance technology could be used in relation to online gaming advertising?
ANIKA WELLS: Since becoming the Communications Minister I have had quite a few meetings in that space about that work from people who represent all different sides of that question and I really look forward to continuing to work with them on trying to deliver something.
ANDREW CLENNELL: And when do you think we’ll see that something?
ANIKA WELLS: As soon as I can manage it.
ANDREW CLENNELL: Anika Wells, thanks so much for your time.
ANIKA WELLS: Such a pleasure.
[End of excerpt]
ANDREW CLENNELL: Anika Wells there and, boy, has she got a lot on her plate.