New Zealand Moves to Ban Social Media for Under-16s

New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s government is moving ahead with legislation that would prevent children under 16 from accessing social media, putting the country on a path towards one of the world’s toughest restrictions on young people’s use of online platforms.

The government said on Monday it would introduce the Online Safety Bill, which would require social media companies to take reasonable steps to stop under-16s from using covered platforms. The proposal is being driven by concerns over harmful content, addictive features and the effects of heavy social media use on children’s mental health, sleep, education and family life.

Luxon said the government believes responsibility cannot rest entirely with parents and that technology companies must also play a role in protecting children online. According to the government, one in three New Zealanders aged 13 to 17 now spends at least five hours a day on social media.

Under the proposed framework, platforms could be required to establish users’ ages through a combination of information already held by the service, facial-age estimation and digital identification methods. Companies that fail to comply could face penalties of up to 10% of their global revenue, although the proposed restrictions would target platforms rather than children or their parents.

The government’s announcement does not mean the ban is already in force. The legislation still has to pass through Parliament, and its political future is far from certain.

Luxon’s coalition partners are not united behind the proposal. New Zealand First leader Winston Peters has rejected the plan and pointed to Australia’s experience with its own under-16 social-media restrictions. Peters has argued that the Australian approach has been unsuccessful and that parents should retain primary responsibility for deciding what their children can access online.

ACT has also expressed opposition, leaving the government with a difficult path if it wants to turn the proposal into law. The timing is particularly important because New Zealand is heading towards an election, meaning the bill's future will depend heavily on the political negotiations and parliamentary timetable that follow its introduction.

Australia’s experience has become a central part of the debate. Canberra’s world-first under-16 social-media restrictions took effect in December 2025, but early evidence suggests that restricting access has been considerably harder than passing the law.

A study by Australia’s eSafety Commissioner found in July that more than 80% of Australian teenagers were still using social media three months after the restrictions began. Account ownership had fallen, but many young people were still able to retain accounts or create new ones, with ineffective age-assurance systems identified as a major reason.

Technology companies have disputed the idea that the early Australian figures demonstrate outright failure, arguing that enforcement is still developing. Meta, for example, said in August that it had removed more than 756,000 accounts it believed belonged to Australians under 16 between December and June, while other major platforms have reported their own enforcement measures.

That experience presents a difficult question for New Zealand: whether a legal age limit can actually keep teenagers off platforms that operate across borders and can use multiple methods to establish or obscure a user's age.

Privacy is another concern. New Zealand has strengthened its rules around biometric information, with its Biometric Processing Privacy Code coming into force in May 2026. The country's Privacy Commissioner has also reported that children's privacy and social-media use are among the public's leading privacy concerns. Any system involving facial analysis, identity documents or other personal information will therefore face scrutiny over what data is collected, who receives it and how long it is retained.

The government is betting that the potential benefits of reducing children's exposure to harmful online environments justify putting greater obligations on technology companies. Critics, meanwhile, are likely to question whether an age-based ban addresses the underlying problems or simply pushes young users towards less visible forms of online activity.

The debate also reflects a broader shift in how governments are approaching the power of social-media platforms. Rather than relying solely on parental controls or voluntary industry safeguards, more countries are now considering direct legal limits on children's access. New Zealand's proposal will therefore be watched beyond its borders, particularly by governments trying to determine whether Australia's experiment can be made more effective or whether the difficulties of enforcement ultimately outweigh the promise of a simple age threshold.

If New Zealand succeeds in putting a workable under-16 restriction into law, it could strengthen a growing international movement towards treating children's access to social media as a matter of public policy rather than simply a family decision. But if the legislation struggles to win political support or reproduce the enforcement problems seen in Australia, it could instead demonstrate how difficult it is for governments to draw a reliable line between children and global digital platforms.