New ‘advanced detection’ AI tools set to crack down on Aussie teen social media accounts
Social media giant Meta will use artificial intelligence to crawl through accounts to find posts about birthdays and school grades in a bid to shut down underage users.
Meta plans to launch a series of initiatives to comply with Australia’s world-first social media ban on under-16s, including AI-powered textual and visual analysis technology that can collect “contextual clues” left behind by young people on their Instagram and Facebook accounts.
A Meta spokesperson said the built-in AI can “analyze entire profiles for contextual clues, such as mentions of birthday celebrations or school grades, across posts, comments, bios, and captions to determine whether an account belongs to a minor.”
“AI will scan photos and videos to look for visual clues about a person’s age that text might miss, such as height or facial size,” the spokesperson said.
“Meta will begin testing this in the US with plans to expand globally for under-13s in the coming months, with under-16s to follow in Australia.
“If we determine that an account is underage, the account will be disabled and the account owner will be required to verify their age to continue using their account.”
Antigone Davis, Meta vice president and head of global security, said the company is “investing heavily in AI-powered technology to find and remove underage accounts” from all company-owned platforms, including Instagram and Facebook.
“These new measures represent a significant step forward in our ability to keep young people safe. We are committed to complying with the social media ban in Australia and will extend these advanced detection tools to under-16s in the coming weeks and months,” he said.
“While we believe these tools make a real difference, we continue to believe that the most effective approach to age assurance is app store-level verification, which gives parents a single, consistent place to manage their child’s access to all apps, rather than requiring each app to address this complex issue independently.”
Australia’s social media ban came into effect on December 10 last year after consistent lobbying by News Corp’s Let There Be Children campaign revealed heartbreaking stories of families who had lost their children to extreme cases of cyberbullying.
The ban bans all Australian children under the age of 16 from using platforms such as Snapchat, Instagram, Reddit and Facebook.
Critics of the ban, such as the Human Rights Law Center, believe that the ban challenges a child’s ability to access information and learn media literacy, and they also vehemently deny the ban’s feasibility.
Supporters of the ban say it will prevent children from being cyberbullied and keep them away from harmful algorithms.
