Millions of teenagers in Australia woke up on Wednesday to find themselves locked out of social media accounts after the government introduced a ban for under-16s – the first of its kind – on the platforms.
Far from being a kneejerk response to a moral panic, it’s a move backed up by detailed investigation into the effects of unfettered online access on children – and one that several other countries are poised to follow. Australian eSafety research found seven in 10 children aged 10 to 15 had encountered content associated with harm online. Three-quarters of those had most recently encountered that – including misogyny, violence, disordered eating and suicide – on a social media platform.
“We are seeking to create some friction [in the] system to protect children where previously there has been close to none … We are treating big tech like the extractive industry it has become,” Australia’s eSafety commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, told an audience earlier this year.
Even so, questions have been raised on the practicalities of enforcing a ban on tech-savvy teenagers, while a young person with disabilities writes eloquently for us this week on the positive benefits that are being removed for some.
Can it work? For our big story this week, Josh Taylor looks at why the ban came about and how it will function, while Doosie Morris speaks to young teens to hear their side of the story.
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Five essential reads in this week’s edition
Spotlight | Syria, one year after Assad
While country’s return to global stage has filled many Syrians with pride, domestically old grievances threaten efforts to rebuild the state. William Christou reports from Damascus
Feature | The inside story of the race to create the ultimate AI
In Silicon Valley, rival companies are spending trillions of dollars to reach a goal that could change humanity – or potentially destroy it. Robert Booth reports
Feature | On the trail of London’s snail farming don
Terry Ball – renowned shoe salesman, friend to former mafiosi – has vowed to spend his remaining years finding ways to cheat authorities he feels have cheated him. His greatest ruse? A tax-dodging snail empire. Jim Waterson caught up with him
Opinion | What words are left to describe Trump’s global rampage?
Deadly US boat strikes in the Caribbean are the latest example of a president corrupting both the law and morality, argues Jonathan Freedland
Culture | The best books of 2025
From fiction to food, people to poetry, science to sport: Guardian critics round up the year’s essential reads
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What else we’ve been reading
• The power and comfort that sewing or knitting offers prisoners is often evidenced in textile exhibitions. Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s story of how making clothes for her daughter, Gabrielle, was an act of love and resilience during her six years’ detention in Iran, and how her new collaboration with Liberty and London’s Imperial War Museum encompasses solidarity, is a beautiful invitation to see the exhibition. Isobel Montgomery, deputy editor
• Christmas should be a time of cheer – but it’s too often also one characterised by excess and waste. If you want to shrink your festive footprint, these practical, expert-backed tips from the Guardian’s Filter team can help make the season more sustainable. Graham Snowdon, editor
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Other highlights from the Guardian website
• Audio | Is AI a bubble that’s about to pop?
• Video | Today in Focus: The Latest. The biggest story of the day in 10 minutes, every weekday evening
• Gallery | ‘They rose out of the ground!’: Scotland’s brutalist beauties
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