Australia's eSafety Commission Eyes Legal Action Against Social Media Giants

Australia's online safety watchdog is eye-on-court action against Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, and YouTube.

These platforms face heat for not blocking enough kids under 16 from signing up.

New laws kicked in on December 10th, banning accounts for anyone that young, and the first compliance report just dropped.

The report demanded 10 big platforms wipe out underage Australian accounts.

They deactivated $5 million, but plenty of kids are still slipping through, making new profiles or beating age checks.

Fires could hit $49.5 million Australian dollars, about $33 million US dollars, for major slip-ups.

Communications Minister Anika Wells called out the five platforms for doing the bare minimum on purpose.

She says they want the lot of flops since Australia's leading the charge, with a dozen countries now copying the ban.

Meta says they're committed, but age checks are tough industry-wide.

Snapchat locked 450,000 accounts and keeps going.

TikTok stayed quiet, and YouTube didn't respond yet.

Other spots like Reddit, X, Kick, Threads, and Twitch aren't under the microscope.

Experts figure courts will rule on what's reasonable flawed tech or not.

E-safety plans to decide on lawsuits by mid-year, pushing platforms to step up and protect young Aussies online for real.

That's the story for today. Canada News Today, driven by AI. I'm Corey with The Story.