Social media age limits: Tech giants ‘show no interest in protecting kids online’

The world-renowned police ­officer behind Australia’s first operation proactively targeting internet child sex offenders says social media giants have “epically failed” to protect children online due to just a lack of interest in doing so.

• The editor: Tech giant excuses are weak

The world-renowned police ­officer behind Australia’s first operation proactively targeting internet child sex offenders says social media giants have “epically failed” to protect children online.

Retired top cop and national children’s champion Professor Jon Rouse APM is one the key leaders behind the nation’s Age Assurance Technology Trial and supported the release of its preliminary findings on Friday.

The findings revealed multiple age-checking platforms could be used to “privately, ­robustly and effectively” help the federal government enforce the 16-plus social media age limit, set to come into effect in December.

The trial also found the ­platforms tested were “generally secure” against hackers but could not be considered ­“infallible”.

Also noted was “concerning evidence” and an “increased risk of privacy breaches” due to a lack of guidelines as to what personal data platforms may have to store for regulators to access for future investigations.

As the trial’s stakeholder advisory board chair, Professor Rouse said he wanted to be ­involved in the trial to drive technology solutions that would help stop the scourge of extortions and suicides stemming from online harm.

Retired top cop and national children’s champion Professor Jon Rouse APM. Picture: Gary Ramage

“Predominantly, my entire career has been about child protection and any potential solution that stops children being exposed to the significant harms that the internet presents was certainly something that I wanted to be a part of,” he said.

“I would overarchingly say that reliance on industry service providers like Meta et cetera to provide a solution to protect children has epically failed due to just a lack of interest in doing so.”

Tech giants Meta and Snapchat were among the 53 companies involved in the trial that will be used as the bedrock for the world-first legislation to raise the minimum age of social media, sparked by News Corp’s Let Them Be Kids ­campaign.

Google and Apple were also among the contributors but TikTok did not volunteer to take part.

Professor Rouse said it was important to have robust discussion around what technical solutions were available to help protect kids online.

“The harm has accelerated from what I’ve been dealing with for most of my career, which is child sexual abuse, to obviously the iteration of sexual extortion of kids now, and we’re losing children’s lives as a result of it,” he said.

UK-based Age Verification Providers Association executive director Iain Corby, whose job it was to encourage tech companies to join the trial, said the calibre of those involved had given the trial credibility around the world as other countries considered their own new laws.