Editor’s note: “Behind the News” is the product of Sun staff assisted by the Sun’s AI lab, which includes a variety of tools such as Anthropic’s Claude, Perplexity AI, Google Gemini and ChatGPT.

Australia’s new under-16 ban is part of a broader global push to rein in how social media treats children, but other countries have mostly opted for age verification, parental consent and “duty of care” rules rather than outright bans.

These measures are driven by mounting evidence linking heavy social media use to anxiety, depression, sleep problems and addictionlike behavior in adolescents, alongside concerns about data exploitation and exposure to harmful content. [1]

Why governments are stepping in

Research has tied high social media use in young teens to higher rates of depressive symptoms

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