New Zealand moves to ban social media for children under 16; 'won't be simple,' says PM Luxon

New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said on Monday (August 24) his party will introduce a bill in Parliament that seeks to ban children under 16 from using social media. The bill would require social media platforms to take reasonable steps to verify users' ages, including by utilising existing account information, facial technology and digital identity documents. It was not immediately clear if the bill would garner sufficient support to pass through Parliament, with one of Luxon's coalition partners, the New Zealand First party, saying it would not support it. In December, Australia became the world's first country to ban social media for children under 16, blocking them from platforms including TikTok, Alphabet's YouTube and Meta's Instagram and Facebook.