Australia's World-First Under-16 Social Media Ban: What It Means for International Influencer Campaigns

Short answer: a binding law, not a political agreement

On 10 December 2025, Australia's Online Safety Amendment (Social Media Minimum Age) Act took binding effect. The law requires what the Australian regulator, the eSafety Commissioner, calls "age-restricted" social media platforms to take "reasonable steps" to prevent under-16s from creating or keeping an account. Ten platforms are explicitly named by eSafety as in scope: Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Threads, TikTok, Twitch, X, YouTube, Kick and Reddit — the list is non-exhaustive. Breaching the law can trigger fines of up to A$49.5 million for systemic non-compliance. The law has been widely described as the world's first binding law of its kind — not a recommendation or a political statement of intent, but a legal obligation with real penalties that has now been in force for several months.

This is practical background from Make Influence, not legal advice. This is Australian law and doesn't apply directly to a Danish brand or a campaign aimed at a Danish audience — but it's worth knowing, because it's the first real-world test of what actually happens when a social media age limit has to be enforced, not just legislated.

What the law actually requires — and what it doesn't

It's worth being precise about the mechanism, because press coverage often describes it imprecisely as a "ban" that automatically deletes every under-16 account. That isn't how the law works. It imposes a duty on platforms to take "reasonable steps" — a legal standard under which a platform breaches the law if it shows an unreasonable failure to prevent access by minors, not automatically the moment a single minor slips past the controls. The obligation sits with the platform, not the child or the parents — the law contains no sanctions aimed at families.

What actually counts as "reasonable steps" is spelled out in the eSafety Commissioner's own regulatory guidance, published 16 September 2025. The guidance describes age assurance as one of several tools a platform can use — not one specific mandated technology.

Which platforms are covered — and which are exempt

The law defines an "age-restricted social media platform" as an electronic service whose sole or significant purpose is to enable online social interaction between two or more users, where users can link to other users, and where users can post material. On 29 July 2025, Australia's Minister for Communications made the Online Safety (Age-Restricted Social Media Platforms) Rules 2025, which specifically exempt services whose primary purpose is something else:

Note that YouTube itself (the main platform) is covered by the law, while the separate YouTube Kids service is exempt — a distinction that's easy to miss if you only look at the company name rather than the specific service.

Enforcement so far: an uncomfortable statistic from the regulator itself

The most interesting thing about Australia's law, from an international vantage point, isn't the text of the law — it's what's actually happened since it took effect. In March 2026, the eSafety Commissioner published a Compliance Update, based on a survey of 803 children (aged 10-15) and their parents, drawing on a baseline measurement taken just before the law took effect in December 2025 and a follow-up conducted in March-April 2026, three months later.

The finding: more than 80% of under-16s who had an account on an age-restricted platform before the law took effect still had access three months later — either because they kept the original account or created a new one. More than half of the children reported no age check at all. 18% were misclassified as 16 or older by the platform's own system, and 37% self-reported an older age than they actually were. Based on the report, eSafety has opened investigations into possible non-compliance by Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok and YouTube.

That's a central point for anyone following Denmark's own, still-unpassed proposal for a similar age limit: a law on paper and a law that's actually enforced are not the same thing. Australia's own numbers show that even a binding law with real fines behind it doesn't automatically produce high compliance in practice — the technical and behavioural challenges of age assurance are real, not just theoretical.

A proposal to double the fines to A$99 million

As a direct response to the weak compliance figures, the Australian government — per multiple independent outlets' coverage in June 2026 (including CBC News, IBTimes UK and Moneywise) — has introduced legislation that would double the maximum fine from A$49.5 million to A$99 million and give the eSafety Commissioner expanded power to compel platforms to hand over evidence of the steps they've actually taken to comply — a power platforms could previously limit or delay access to. This proposal is, as of this article's publication, not yet passed into law — it's a political response to the compliance problems, not a current fine amount.

How Australia's law compares with Denmark's own proposal

It's tempting to put the two side by side — both are about an age limit for social media access — but they're at very different stages and rest on different mechanisms. See the full breakdown of the Danish situation in Denmark's under-15 social media age limit.

In other words: Australia's experience is the closest documented real-world test available of how a law like Denmark's own proposal would actually function in practice, if and when it's passed — but it's still a different law, in a different country, with a different enforcement model, and the results don't transfer one-to-one.

What does this mean for a brand running international influencer campaigns?

This section is Make Influence's own assessment, not a legal conclusion.

For a Danish brand running campaigns exclusively aimed at a Danish or Nordic audience, this law changes nothing directly — it's Australian legislation, and it doesn't replace the Danish rules on marketing to children and teenagers through influencers, which already apply today independently of any platform-access age limit.

But for a brand, agency or creator with a genuine Australian audience segment — for example, a global campaign that also reaches Australia via one of the ten covered platforms — there are two practical things worth knowing. First: in theory, the youngest slice of the audience (under 16) on these platforms should shrink in Australia over time, as enforcement improves. Second, and more important right now: eSafety's own numbers show you cannot assume that shrinkage has already happened. A brand planning a campaign with a younger-audience component in Australia shouldn't assume the platform's user base there has already been cleared of under-16 users, just because the law has been in force for over a year.

Our recommendation: don't treat Australia's law as a template for what Denmark will end up with — the mechanisms differ, and a Danish MitID-based system could turn out more or less effective in practice than Australia's platform-driven "reasonable steps" model. Use it instead for what it actually is: the best documented example available of how large the gap can be between a law as written and a law as actually enforced — and a reminder to always verify an influencer's audience directly, regardless of which country's age rules formally apply to a given campaign.

Decision framework

IF your campaigns are aimed exclusively at a Danish or Nordic audience → Australia's law doesn't apply to you directly; the binding rules are still Denmark's own children-and-young-people rules, see marketing to children and teenagers through influencers.

IF you're running or considering a campaign with a genuine Australian audience segment on one of the ten covered platforms → don't assume the platform's under-16 users are already gone; check the influencer's actual follower demographics directly, as described in how to verify an influencer's audience before you pay.

IF you're working with a creator on one of the covered platforms, such as Kick or Reddit → remember that a platform's "age-restricted" status under Australian law says nothing in itself about what share of its Danish audience is under 18 — that's a separate question, covered by Denmark's own rules.

IF you're following the Danish debate on a comparable age limit → use Australia's compliance figures as a realistic expectation of how fast and how effectively a Danish model will actually work, rather than assuming a passed law automatically means immediate, full effect.

FAQ

Does Australia's law apply to a Danish brand's campaigns?

No, not directly. The law is Australian legislation and imposes obligations on platforms, not on brands. It doesn't replace Denmark's own rules on marketing to children and young people, which apply independently.

Which platforms are covered by Australia's ban?

The eSafety Commissioner has named ten platforms: Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Threads, TikTok, Twitch, X, YouTube, Kick and Reddit. The list is non-exhaustive. Messaging services (Messenger, WhatsApp), gaming services (Steam, Discord) and professional/education services (GitHub, Google Classroom) are explicitly exempt.

Is the law actually working?

According to the eSafety Commissioner's own Compliance Update from March 2026, more than 80% of under-16s who had an account before the law took effect still had access three months later. eSafety has opened investigations into possible non-compliance at several of the major platforms.

What's the difference between Australia's law and Denmark's proposal?

Australia's law is binding and has been in force since 10 December 2025, with a 16-year threshold and no parental-consent exception. Denmark's proposal is, as of this article's publication, still only a political agreement from November 2025, with a proposed threshold of 15 and access from 13 with parental consent.

Can platforms be fined every single time a child under 16 creates an account?

No. The law uses a "reasonable steps" standard — a platform breaches the law if it shows an unreasonable failure to prevent access, not automatically because one child gets past the controls. That's why the current debate is about systemic non-compliance, not isolated cases.

Is the A$49.5 million fine being raised?

Per multiple outlets' coverage from June 2026, legislation has been introduced to double the maximum fine to A$99 million in response to the weak compliance figures. As of this article's publication, that proposal has not yet been passed into law.