Meta said it had removed more than 750,000 Facebook and Instagram accounts suspected of belonging to Australians under 16, as the country’s internet regulator weighs enforcement action over its teen social media ban.
Meta said it had deactivated 462,000 Instagram and 294,000 Facebook accounts suspected of belonging to Australians under 16. The figures are up from 331,000 Instagram and 173,000 Facebook accounts removed by January.
Meta says it wants to comply with Australia’s under-16 social media ban, despite opposing the law. The country’s internet regulator is considering legal action against platforms it says have failed to comply.
No other platforms have released compliance data covering the same period as Meta, but Australian government figures and multiple independent studies have shown that more than eight in 10 under-16s were still on social media during the ban's first three months.
The Australian government proposed the landmark law, which came into force on 10 December, amid concerns about social media's impact on the physical and mental health of children and young teenagers.
Australia has accused social media platforms of deliberately setting the under-16 ban up to fail as other countries consider similar restrictions.
It has also introduced legislation to double the maximum penalty for non-compliance to A$99 million ($69.75 million) and give the regulator greater powers to obtain documents.
Representatives of Meta, TikTok, YouTube owner Google and Snapchat owner Snap are scheduled to give evidence on Friday to a parliamentary inquiry into the changes, alongside regulatory and government officials.
"Enforcement is ongoing, and these numbers will continue to grow," Meta said in a statement.
"We share the Australian Government's goal of ensuring young people have safe, age-appropriate experiences online, and we are meeting our obligations under the law," the company added.
A 2025 Australian trial of age assurance technology found that products already on the market could effectively support the ban.
Most large platforms, including those owned by Meta, rolled out photo-based age estimation software, although they say they typically first subject users to age inference, which estimates a person's age based on their online activity.
Meta said it was using AI to analyse user profiles for "contextual clues that an account may belong to someone under 16, such as birthday celebrations or mentions of school grades" and to analyse reports about suspected underage accounts.
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