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Kids are outsmarting social media bans. That’s not a problem we need to solve
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- DeepHorus
Social media bans for minors are multiplying, but children are quickly finding ways around them. In July, France joined Australia in restricting minors from major platforms, barring children under 15 before the country’s top court blocked the measure on human rights grounds. The United Kingdom aims to forbid children under 16 from accessing Facebook, TikTok and other platforms in early 2027, while the European Union has announced a plan to prohibit social media for children under 15. These policies share a common assumption: that age gates can keep young people off platforms, but early evidence suggests otherwise.
Australia, which enacted a ban in 2024, offers the clearest test. A study published earlier this year found that four in five teens under 16 made their way onto barred platforms. Teens have used many tactics to bypass bans, from using a sibling’s face for ID verification to drawing fake facial hair. Some ban proponents respond by calling for stricter enforcement to block these workarounds. But circumvention is a signal, not merely a nuisance to be deterred.
The fact that kids actively seek ways to outwit bans highlights their limitations, critics of the restrictions argue. Social media bans suppress young people’s access to information, including material that can be essential to development, identity formation and socialization, especially during adolescence. Worse, further restriction is likely to backfire. Closing loopholes in age gates could push children toward less-moderated, higher-risk corners of the web. It can also degrade privacy and security for everyone by forcing people to submit sensitive personal information to prove their age.
Parents and children both want smarter, more nuanced policies that protect children, families and their rights, according to research on social media safety interventions. Such policies could include stronger limits on data collection by companies or flexible tools that let families control content and access on their own terms. Age gates will not bring about the desired change, nor will they simplify parenting in the digital world. At best, they raise thornier questions and postpone the conversation to a child’s 16th birthday. At worst, they leave kids with no guidance as they navigate online life.
When young people circumvent restrictions, they often do what developing minds are expected to do and what is celebrated in other contexts: lean into curiosity, solve problems and exercise independence. It is important for kids to do this online, where they often develop social skills and refine their identities. Bans sweep these motivations under the rug, taking a paternalistic approach that does not consider young people’s needs or the realities of what they do online.
The restrictions also ignore what some parents want. In research last year, parents said they often join their kids in lies that help them gain access to needed but gated services. This is not new: research from 2011 showed that parents taught their children how to evade Facebook age restrictions. Parents are not a monolithic group. Many see responsible access to social media as a way to help children connect with like-minded peers, find informational content and learn digital safety skills early, and believe the benefits outweigh the risks.
When parents do not help provide access and kids cannot get onto desired platforms, they will likely move toward alternative online spaces, often ones with fewer guardrails. Sometimes they wind up on fairly innocuous, if unconventional, platforms, communicating through Google Docs or podcast comment sections. The challenge for policymakers, then, is not to close every loophole. It is to design protections that keep young people safer without driving them into darker, less accountable corners of the internet.
