// MIT TECH REVIEW — INTELLIGENZA ARTIFICIALE
Kids are outsmarting social media bans. That’s not a problem we need to solve.
Age gates can be staggeringly counterproductive, pushing kids to darker corners of the web. Closing loopholes will only make things worse.
Social media bans are stacking up. In July, France joined Australia in restricting minors from accessing social media—barring children under 15 from major platforms, before the ban was blocked by the country’s top court on human rights grounds. The UK aims to forbid kids under 16 from accessing Facebook, TikTok, and other platforms in early 2027, and the EU has announced its own plan to prohibit social media for kids under 15.
But early lessons from Australia, which enacted a ban in 2024, show that these sorts of age restrictions are easily circumvented. A study published earlier this year found that four in five teens under 16 made their way onto barred platforms. Teens have successfully explored many tactics for bypassing bans, from using a sibling’s face for ID to drawing fake facial hair.
Some proponents of bans have called for an increased focus on enforcement that blocks these workarounds. But circumvention is a signal, not a nuisance or something to be simply deterred. The fact that kids are actively looking for ways to outwit the bans highlights their limitations. Social media bans suppress kids’ access to information, including information that’s essential to their development, identity formation, and socialization, especially during adolescence. Worse, further restriction is likely to backfire. Closing loopholes in age gates could harm kids by pushing them toward less-moderated, higher-risk corners of the web. It also degrades privacy and security for everyone by forcing people to submit sensitive personal information to prove their age.
In our work, we’ve found that parents and kids both want smarter, more nuanced policies that protect children, families, and their rights. That can take the form of mandating stronger limits on data collection by companies, or giving families flexible tools to control content and access on their own terms.
Age gates won’t bring about the desired change, nor will they simplify parenting in the digital world. At best, they will only raise thornier questions and postpone the conversation to a child’s 16th birthday. At worst, they’ll leave kids with no guidance as they make their way through the online world.
When young people circumvent restrictions, they are often doing what we want developing minds to do and what we celebrate in other contexts: lean into curiosity, problem-solve, and exercise independence. It’s important for kids to do this online, an arena where they often develop social skills and refine their identities. Bans sweep these motivations under the rug, taking a paternalistic approach that doesn’t consider young people’s needs or the realities of what they do online.
It also ignores what some parents want. When we examined social media safety interventions last year, parents told us that they often join their kids in lies that help them gain access to needed but gated services. This isn’t a new phenomenon; research all the way back in 2011 showed that parents taught their children how to evade Facebook age restrictions. Some may say these parents are oblivious to the harms posed by the web or just don’t care. But parents are not a monolithic group. Many simply see offering their children responsible access to social media as a way to help them connect with like-minded peers, find informational content, and learn digital safety skills early on. Many parents believe the benefits outweigh the risks.
When parents don’t help provide access and kids are not able to get into the platforms they desire, they will likely move toward alternative online spaces, often ones with fewer guardrails. Sometimes kids wind up on fairly innocuous, if unconventional, platforms, communicating with each other in Google Docs or podcast comment sections. Other times they move to more dangerous platforms that can leave them vulnerable to abuse and predat