Reddit takes high court challenge to Australia’s children’s social media ban

Reddit has launched a challenge to Australia’s Supreme Court against the country’s landmark social media ban on children.

The online forum is one of 10 social media platforms that must ban Australians under 16 from having accounts under a new law that comes into force on Wednesday.

The ban has been closely watched around the world, with activists and governments saying it is necessary to protect children from harmful content and algorithms.

Reddit is complying with the ban but will argue in its case that the policy has serious implications for privacy and political rights. It is the second such legal challenge and two Australian teenagers are also awaiting a High Court hearing.

“While well-intentioned, this law does not serve its purpose,” Reddit said in an update on its website.

“The Australian Government has more effective ways to achieve our shared goal of protecting young people.”

Australian Communications Minister Anika Wells has previously said the government would not be swayed by legal threats.

“We will not be intimidated by Big Tech. On behalf of Australian parents, we will stand firm,” she told parliament after the meeting News of first legal challenge It broke last month.

The High Court has agreed to hear the case next year on a yet-to-be-determined date, with two 15-year-olds from New South Wales claiming the social media ban is unconstitutional because it infringes on the “implied freedom of communication in government and political matters”.

“Democracy does not start at 16 as the law says,” Macey Newland told the BBC after the case was filed.

The ban has excited global leaders and worried technology companies, but has also drawn criticism from some who say a blanket ban is impractical and unwise.

Experts worry that children will get around bans relatively easily — either by tricking the technology that performs age checks or by finding other places on the web to congregate that may be less safe.

Backed by some mental health advocates, many kids are pushing back Depriving young people of connections – especially those from LGBTQ+, neurodiverse or rural communities – this will leave them less able to cope with the realities of life online.

But the policy is wildly popular with parents and has won support from Oprah, Prince Harry and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, among others.

In a statement on their website, the pair praised Australia’s “bold” action but said “it should not have gotten to this”.

“We hope this ban is just the beginning of a reckoning between society and the tech companies that build these platforms with growth, not security, as their first principle.”

Governments from Florida to the European Union have been trying to limit children’s use of social media. But Australia is the first jurisdiction to deny parental approval exemptions to such policies, in addition to the higher age limit of 16 – making its laws some of the strictest in the world.

Reddit said the law forces “an intrusive and potentially unsafe verification process for adults and minors,” segregates teens who participate in “age-appropriate community experiences,” and creates an “illogical patchwork of which platforms are included and which are not.”

“There are more targeted privacy safeguards to protect young people online without having to resort to blanket bans.”

It added that the case was not an “attempt to evade compliance” or “an effort to retain younger users for commercial reasons”.

“Unlike other platforms covered by this law, the vast majority of Reddit users are adults, and we do not market to or target ads to children under 18,” it said.

Other platforms affected by the ban include Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and TikTok.