“It is [an] action we saw time and time again by Big Tobacco against tobacco control, and we are seeing it now by some social media or big tech giants,” an Australian health official said in response to Reddit’s lawsuit.
Reddit has filed a lawsuit in Australia’s highest court, claiming that the country’s recently-enacted ban on social media accounts for children under the age of 16 violates their right to political communication.
According to The New York Times, Australia’s social-media ban requires 10 services, including Reddit, to set the minimum age for account-holders at 16. Other popular applications, including TikTok and Instagram, are bound by similar requirements. Since the law took effect, hundreds of thousands of children across the country have found their accounts suddenly deactivated.
Although teenagers have reported that it remains easy to circumvent the ban, Australian officials say that the law nonetheless represents a first-ever attempt to protect children from predators and the well-documented negative mental health effects of using social media.
Reddit, though, claims that the law unnecessarily and unlawfully infringes upon teenagers’ right to participate in political discussions.
“Australian citizens under the age of 16 will, within years if not months, become electors. The choices to be made by those citizens will be informed by political communication in which they engage prior to the age of 18,” attorneys for Reddit wrote in a 12-page legal filing.
Lawyers for the United States-based websites were also quick to note that the ban doesn’t make much sense when it comes to Reddit—visitors to the website don’t need to make an account to access most content, meaning that “the reduction of risk of harm is minimal (at best).”
“We believe there are more effective ways for the Australian government to accomplish our shared goal of protecting youth, and the SMMA (Social Media Minimum Age) law carries some serious privacy and political expression issues for everyone on the internet,” Reddit said in a statement.
Reddit also said that the process used to determine which platforms should be subject to stricter controls is little more than an “illogical patchwork” of guidelines and standards.
“While we agree with the importance of protecting people under 16, this law has the unfortunate effect of forcing intrusive and potentially insecure verification processes on adults as well as minors, isolating teens from the ability to engage in age-appropriate community experiences (including political discussions), and creating an illogical patchwork of which platforms are included and which aren’t,” Reddit said.
In a statement, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said that his office plans to “stand firm to protect young Australians from experiencing harm on social media.”
Mark Butler, the country’s health minister, said that Reddit’s lawsuit has little to do with children’s rights and safety and is, instead, a blatant attempt to protect its profits.
“It is [an] action we saw time and time again by Big Tobacco against tobacco control, and we are seeing it now by some social media or big tech giants,” Butler told reporters in Brisbane.
Sources
Reddit challenges Australia’s world-first law banning children under 16 from social media
Reddit Sues Australian Government to Block Social Media Ban
Reddit sues Australia over social media ban, citing free speech threat
Join the conversation!