Meta said that it has taken down more than 756,000 accounts it suspected belonged to Australians under 16 since the country’s social media ban for teens took effect, as the company faces the prospect of regulatory enforcement action over compliance.
According to Reuters, Meta reported deactivating 462,000 suspect Instagram accounts and 294,000 suspect Facebook accounts in the period from just before the ban’s December 10 start date through June. That marks a sharp increase from the 331,000 Instagram accounts and 173,000 Facebook accounts Meta had reported removing by January.
The disclosure lands as Australia’s internet regulator, eSafety, considers an enforcement lawsuit against platforms it says have not done enough to comply with the law, which bars under-16s from holding social media accounts on concerns about the effect of the platforms on young people’s mental and physical health. Representatives from Meta, TikTok, YouTube owner Google and Snap are scheduled to testify on August 14 at a parliamentary inquiry into the ban, alongside regulatory and government officials.
“Enforcement is ongoing, and these numbers will continue to grow,” Meta said in a statement, adding that it is “meeting our obligations under the law.”
Meta’s figures cover a longer window than eSafety’s own initial compliance data, which found that major platforms operating in Australia restricted roughly 4.7 million accounts believed to belong to under-16 users industry-wide by mid-December alone. eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant said at the time that the early numbers were encouraging but cautioned it was too early to call the rollout fully compliant, and that some underage accounts would remain active as age assurance systems were refined.
Despite the takedowns, government figures and independent studies cited in Reuters’ report found more than eight in 10 under-16s were still on social media during the ban’s first three months, a gap that helps explain why Australian lawmakers have moved to raise the stakes. Lawmakers have moved to double the maximum penalty for platform non-compliance to A$99 million, and regulators have been given expanded document discovery powers.
Meta said its enforcement now relies on AI systems that scan for “contextual clues that an account may belong to someone under 16, such as birthday celebrations or mentions of school grades,” in addition to reviewing user reports of suspected underage accounts. The company has also closed a previous loophole that let someone repeatedly create new accounts after an earlier one was deleted.
Dragomir is a Serbian freelance blog writer and translator. He is passionate about covering insightful stories and exploring topics such as influencer marketing, the creator economy, technology, business, and cyber fraud.
