Beginning in December, Australians will be required to verify their age to use search engines like Google and Bing. Users will have to scan their face or do an identity check when using the search engine as a logged-in user.
The changes are a result of industry code, not rule changes from the country’s parliament, according to The Guardian. The tech industry develops the codes, then the eSafety commissioner — an unelected official — registers them in a process called co-regulation.
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The change is expected to take effect on Dec. 27 and is part of an effort to limit children’s access to adult content online.
How it works
According to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Google and its rival Microsoft will be required to implement some form of age-assurance technology by Dec. 27. If the companies fail to comply, they could face fines of up to nearly $50 million per breach.
The new regulations list seven main methods for verifying age:
- Photo ID checks.
- Face scanning age estimation tools.
- Credit card checks.
- Digital ID.
- Vouching by the parent of a young person.
- Using AI to guess a user’s age based on the data the company already has.
- Relying on a third party that has already checked the user’s age.
The search results for logged-in users under the age of 18 will then be filtered for pornography, high-impact violence, material promoting eating disorders and a range of other content.
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Beginning Dec. 10, Australia will ban children under 16 from using social media apps, including TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat, X, Facebook and Reddit.
Changes cause concerns
That process has some Australian politicians nervous. Australian Sen. David Shoebridge called the new code “staggering.”
“These proposals don’t have to go through an elected parliament and we can’t vote them down no matter how significant concerns are,” Shoebridge said. “That, combined with lack of public input, is a serious issue.”
Lizzie O’Shea with Digital Rights Watch, an Australian nonprofit, expressed concerns about the public’s lack of say in the new codes.
“It’s not clear that there is a social licence for such important and nuanced changes,” O’Shea said. “We would argue that the public deserves more of a say in how to balance these important human rights issues.”
Other online safeguards
The new safeguards come after Australia announced it would ban children under the age of 16 from using social media, beginning Dec. 10. That ban sparked significant media attention, unlike the new codes, which have mostly gone unnoticed.
Julie Inman Grant, Australia’s eSafety commissioner, briefly mentioned the new codes in June, saying, “These provisions will serve as a bulwark and operate in lock step with the new social media age limits.”
“It’s critical to ensure the layered safety approach,” Grant said. “Including on the app stores and at the device level — the physical gateways to the internet where kids sign up and first declare their ages.”
