More than 50,000 sign petition to raise of children on social media to 16

More than 50,000 people across Australia have signed a petition to raise the age of children accessing social media from 13 to 16.

More than 50,000 people have signed a petition to raise the age of children accessing social media from 13 to 16.

As of Thursday afternoon, 50,025 people had signed the petition on change.org as part of News Corp Australia’s Let Them Be Kids campaign, which highlighted the shocking rates of mental health and physical harms linked to social media.

It comes after Opposition Leader Peter Dutton on Thursday announced he would pledge to introduce a verification system so age limits on platforms like Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook and Tik Tok were properly enforced.

The pledge comes after Mr Dutton had previously said the coalition would raise the age of kids accessing social media from 13 to 16 within 100 days of taking office.

Generic iPhone. Picture: iStock

Queensland chief health officer John Gerrard has also backed the push to increase the age of access.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has previously announced he would deliver a $6.5 million trial of age verification technology to examine how it could effectively be done.

Dani Elachi, Founder of the Heads Up Alliance and a father of five has previously said additional safeguards were needed to protect the kids.

“I think the age should be raised to 16,” he said.

“I just feel that the kids, they’re not children and they’re not adults, the teens, they are the vulnerable ones because they believe what they hear, what they see on the net.”

Originally published as More than 50,000 sign petition to raise of children on social media to 16