Australia led the charge on banning children under 16 from social media platforms such as Instagram and Tiktok, and now much of the Asia-Pacific region — with its young, tech-savvy markets — is eager to follow. The collective push will be impossible for tech platforms to ignore.

Indonesia plans to implement its restrictions later this month, while India’s Karnataka state, home to tech hub Bengaluru, along with Malaysia and Vietnam, have proposed similar rules.

The appeal is obvious. These measures are politically popular and ultra-wealthy Big Tech chiefs are easy villains. The push also comes as social media giants face their own “Big Tobacco” reckoning at home, confronting thousands of lawsuits that allege their products were designed to hook young users at the expense of their safety and mental health — claims the companies vehemently deny.

It’s become clear that age limits are now good politics. But are they effective policies? They may prove to be a useful stopgap, but they also let governments and tech companies dodge the harder fight.

Despite Meta Platforms Inc. Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg’s complaint that age verification is “very difficult,” blocking a 14-year-old from Instagram may be easier than confronting a billion-dollar-business model. A company that knows its users well enough to sell highly targeted ads, and promises a future of super-intelligent personalized AI agents, shouldn’t pretend that a more credible age check is beyond its powers.

Still, the enforceability debate can sometimes feel like a sideshow. Society doesn’t protect children with thresholds alone. You can’t get a driver’s license until a certain age, but after that there are seatbelt requirements and speed limits and a whole set of rules for the road to keep everyone safe.

More than three months since Australia’s ban, it’s too early to see data on its outcomes. Jonathan Haidt, whose book The Anxious Generation helped inspire the Australian law, said in a recent podcast interview that it will take years to see the true impact. But if the data doesn’t improve within five years, he added, “I would then have to conclude that I was wrong in thinking that reducing social media use would improve mental health.” Still, he makes a compelling case that limits are worth trying because teen social media use is linked to a broader set of harms, from sextortion schemes to drug overdose deaths.

But in the same interview, Haidt offered a more revealing point: He said he would “never” take the internet away from children. The target, in his view, is social media, not the broader web. This distinction is at the heart of the debate, and too often it gets lost. Haidt recalled the earliest web, during the 90s. It was messy, but it was also open. It helped isolated young people find information and community.

Today’s dominant platforms are more corrosive. They sort, rank and push content according to what will keep people scrolling. The question for policymakers is not just how to delay a teenager’s first login, but how to force companies to make these systems less manipulative for new users.

That starts with the algorithms. Facebook and Instagram each have three billion monthly users, an unthinkable global reach that’s hard to unseat. Governments should demand far more transparency about what powers recommendation systems, how they amplify harmful material, and what safeguards exist for minors and adults alike. They must set product standards that curb addictive features, strengthen content moderation, and force companies to invest much more on safety. It cannot continue taking a backseat to spending astronomical sums on AI and “metaverse” moonshots.

The debate over age limits can sometimes feel like an argument about yesterday’s internet, like trying to block teens from joining Myspace when they’ve moved on to creating AI companions. But the urgency is only rising. A 14-year-old shouldn’t be exposed to digitally undressed images of minors when they log online. But neither should 16-year-olds, or even 30-year-olds.

It’s not only Big Tech lobbyists raising objections to hardline bans. Psychologists, academics, local human rights advocates, and the United Nations children’s agency have all warned that blunt restrictions can create new risks — from more personal data collection, more room for governments to police online speech, and more incentives for youth to retreat to smaller, less visible corners of the web. These aren’t arguments for inaction, but demands for real guardrails.

The push for age limits is a welcome break from the fantasy that tech companies can police themselves. But a birthday isn’t a safety policy. Until governments regulate the systems driving harm, rather than merely the ages allowed to see it, they will still be targeting the users instead of the business model.

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This column reflects the personal views of the author and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.

Catherine Thorbecke is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering Asia tech. Previously she was a tech reporter at CNN and ABC News.

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