Australia approved yesterday a social media ban for children aged under 16 after an emotive debate that has gripped the nation, setting a benchmark for jurisdictions around the world with one of the toughest regulations targeting Big Tech.

The law forces tech giants from Instagram and Facebook owner Meta to TikTok to stop minors logging in or face fines of up to A$49.5 million ($32 million). A trial of methods to enforce it will start in January with the ban to take effect in a year, Reuters reported from Sydney, Australia yesterday.

The Social Media Minimum Age Bill sets Australia up as a test case for a growing number of governments, which have legislated or said they plan to legislate an age restriction on social media amid concern about its mental health impact on young people.

Countries including France and some US states have passed laws to restrict access for minors without a parent’s permission, but the Australian ban is absolute. A full under-14s ban in Florida is being challenged in court on free speech grounds.

Getting the law passed after a marathon last day of Australia’s parliamentary year marks a political win for centre-left Prime Minister Anthony Albanese who goes to an election in 2025 amid sagging opinion polls. The ban faced opposition from privacy advocates and some child rights groups, but 77 percent of the population wanted it, according to latest polls.

Against the backdrop of a parliamentary inquiry through 2024, which heard evidence from parents of children who had self-harmed due to social media bullying, domestic media backed the ban led by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp, the country’s biggest newspaper publisher, with a campaign called “Let Them Be Kids”.

The ban could, however, strain Australia’s relationship with key ally the United States, where X owner Elon Musk, a central figure in the administration of president-elect Donald Trump, said in a post this month it seemed a “backdoor way to control access to the Internet by all Australians”.

It also builds on an existing mood of antagonism between Australia and mostly US-domiciled tech giants. Australia was the first country to make social media platforms pay media outlets royalties for sharing their content and now plans to threaten them with fines for failing to stamp out scams.

A spokesperson for Meta said the Facebook owner respected Australian law, but it was “concerned” about the process, which “rushed the legislation through while failing to properly consider the evidence, what industry already does to ensure age-appropriate experiences, and the voices of young people.”

“The task now turns to ensuring there is productive consultation on all rules associated with the Bill to ensure a technically feasible outcome that does not place an onerous burden on parents and teens and a commitment that rules will be consistently applied across all social apps used by teens,” the spokesperson said.

Representatives of TikTok and X, which the government has said would be affected by the ban, were not immediately available for comment.

The companies, including Alphabet’s Google, whose subsidiary YouTube is exempt because it is widely used in schools, had argued the legislation should be postponed until after the age verification trial.

“It’s cart before horse,” said Sunita Bose, managing director of Digital Industry Group, which has most social media companies as members.

“We have the bill but we don’t have guidance from the Australian government around what are the right methods that a whole host of services subject to this law will need to employ,” Bose added, speaking to Reuters.

Enie Lam, a Sydney school student who recently turned 16, said social media contributed to body image problems and cyber bullying but a total ban may drive young people to less visible, more dangerous parts of the internet.