Last year, Australia became the first country to ban social media apps for teenagers. Now the country’s Internet regulator wants Apple to lock AI apps under its new age verification rules.
Australia’s internet regulator said it may push search engines and app stores to block AI services that fail to verify user ages after a Reuters review. The review found that majority of the 50 most popular text-based AI tools show no clear steps of implementing age verification or content filtering ahead of a March 9 deadline.
On that date, AI platforms such as OpenAI must comply with a series of requirements designed to prevent users under 18 from accessing pornography, extreme violence, self-harm, or eating disorder content. If they don’t, they face fines up to about US$35 million.
It’s part of Australia’s effort to protect the mental health of young folks. Beginning December 10, 2025, a new Australian law required certain social media platforms operating in Australia to prevent people under 16 from having a social media account.
Impacted developers are responsible for making sure they follow the requirements of the new eSafety law, including deactivating any existing accounts for users under 16 and monitoring new signups. Apple is addressing the situation in a new post for developers dubbed “New Requirements for Social Media Apps in Australia.”
“eSafety will use the full range of our powers where there is non-compliance,” a spokesperson told Cybernews, including “action in respect of gatekeeper services such as search engines and app stores that provide key points of access to particular services”.
eSafety was “concerned that AI companies are leveraging emotional manipulation, anthropomorphism and other advanced techniques to entice, entrance and entrench young people into excessive chatbot usage”, the spokesperson said.
Apple didn’t respond to a Cybernews request for comment, but said on its website last week that it would use “reasonable methods” to stop minors downloading 18+ apps in Australia and other jurisdictions that are introducing age restrictions, without specifying the methods.
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Article provided with permission from AppleWorld.Today
