New Zealand: Government proposes ban on social media use for under-16s

Rome, 24 Aug. (LaPresse) – New Zealand’s conservative coalition government has tabled a bill in Parliament aimed at banning under-16s from using social media and proposing fines of up to 10 per cent of a platform’s global turnover in the event of non-compliance. The bill would require social media platforms to take reasonable measures to verify users’ ages, including by using existing account information, facial recognition technology and digital identity documents. “We absolutely cannot accept the harm being done to a generation of New Zealand children,” said Prime Minister Christopher Luxon in a statement.