Is this a sticking plaster solution?

Help! No I’m not asking for money...this time. I need your help to get my head around my position on this under 16 social media ban. 

I am speaking on a panel at our AGM on the 8th November about the topic and have been working myself into a panic over it. Then someone helpfully suggested that if I was so worried about doing a good job advocating for the supporters of the Free Speech Union, I could just ask them what they think!

Just some background in case you aren’t fully across the detail yet: National MP Catherine Wedd’s Social Media (Age-Appropriate Users) Bill was drawn from the biscuit tin, meaning Parliament will now debate whether New Zealand should ban under 16s from using social media and require platforms to verify the age of all users. 
 
On paper, it sounds simple. In practice, it raises some of the thorniest questions we’ve faced about freedom, technology, and the role of the state in our private lives. 
 
Sometimes social media can be like the wild West. All stand offs, shoot outs, and vigilantes in comment sections handing out “justice”. I’ve been through some rough times thanks to some not very nice people online myself, and I worry about social media’s impact on young people. The anxiety spirals, the body-image obsession, the doom-scrolling at all hours of the night, the constant dopamine drip of “likes”... It is concerning.

Supporters of the Bill to ban under 16s from social media argue the status quo isn’t working. And I tend to think they might be right. 
 
We’re seeing links between heavy social-media use and anxiety, depression, loneliness, and disordered eating. Reports of bullying and exploitation are rife. And unlike the playground, the digital world never closes for the day. 
 
If you’ve read Jonathan Haidt’s The Anxious Generation (our Chair Stephen Franks might say I’ve been “radicalised” by him) you’ll know that the case for stronger protection is compelling. Haidt argues that adolescence and smartphones are a combustible mix. When the brain is still developing, exposure to infinite comparison, outrage, and sexualisation rewires how young people see themselves and the world. 
 
So, the idea of drawing a line is tempting and makes sense to me. 

But, and it is a big BUT….here’s the problem: you can’t keep under 16s out without checking everyone. 
 
And that’s where my enthusiasm starts shrivelling up.

To enforce an age restriction, platforms will have to verify identity. That means every user, every New Zealander, will eventually need to prove who they are before logging in. 
 
And if you believe that once they build that infrastructure, it will stay confined to age limits, I’ve got a bridge to sell you. 
 
The concern I am seeing expressed widely is that this will morph into a digital-ID system. One that could easily be extended to “protect” against misinformation, “hate speech,” or whatever the government of the day defines as harm. 
 
Today’s child-protection measure could become tomorrow’s speech-control mechanism. Even setting aside the philosophical risks, the practical challenges with this are enormous.
 

Reliable age verification without using government-issued IDs or biometric data simply doesn’t exist. The systems that do attempt to estimate age, often through facial analysis,  are notoriously error-prone, and even when they do work, they depend on creating vast data repositories that are vulnerable to misuse, leaks, or hacking. 
 
Compliance mechanisms tend to overshoot too: when platforms face penalties for getting it wrong, they err on the side of caution by over-blocking or restricting access, which inevitably means lawful speech is silenced. Smaller local platforms could also be crushed under the cost of compliance, leaving only the global tech giants with the resources to navigate the new rules. And then there’s the false positives and lockouts.

In short, in the effort to stop 14-year-olds from logging on, we could end up building a system that locks out 40-year-olds and compromises everyone’s right to free speech in the process. And that’s not to mention the fact that most 14-year-olds will likely have either sussed out a work around; been driven to darker, more inhospitable parts of the internet; or had their age checking data aggregated as a honeypot target for hackers! 

This may just be one giant makeshift band aid to make politicians look and feel better, but that doesn’t even serve it’s original purpose.

Our Council have been discussing this Bill and the many issues it raises. These discussions have been…robust to say the least.

The Free Speech Union has and will always oppose blunt, heavy-handed measures that risk curtailing freedom of expression especially when so-called “compliance” rules push platforms to over-remove lawful content or silence users. Not to mention vague laws that will undoubtedly be weaponised against unpopular speech, rather than content that is already illegal.

Some of us are more concerned than others about what the social media monster is doing to our little darlings, but none of us are dismissive of the impact of this relatively (in the grand scheme of history) new technology on young people. But we are hyper alert to the harms that come from state overreach and the way new bureaucratic powers, once granted, almost always grow beyond their original purpose and putting the genie back in the lamp is virtually impossible.

But we think we can have our cake and eat it too. How can we equip parents, teachers, and our young people to handle social media responsibly, while protecting all Kiwis' speech rights?

It is evident that this bill, in its current, very vague form, is bad, and we will oppose it. But we need your help to understand which aspects you care the most about. 

What are you most worried about? Do you want us to go in all guns blazing? Or are you worried, like I am, that National and Labour will get together to push this through and we are better to try work with them to mitigate the damage? 

If the purple coalition is determined to pursue it, or something like it, it must include iron-clad safeguards to protect free expression and privacy. That means no mandatory national digital ID or any back-door creation through “age assurance” systems. 
 
We also tend to think that the Bill’s scope must be tightly limited to major social media platforms, not forums, blogs, or messaging apps. Users wrongly blocked must have due-process and appeal rights, and there must be full transparency reporting so we can see how much content is being taken down and why. Do you agree? 

We have pulled together a short and sweet survey on these issues. Will you tell us what you think? 
 
Your opinions will help shape not only how I approach the panel at our AGM, but also how we prepare for writing our submission on the bill and what action we take to mobilise support or opposition. 
 
Kiwis can protect our kids and preserve our freedoms. But only if we stay awake to the trade-offs and speak up before the state decides what “safe speech” looks like. 
 
Please take a few minutes to complete the survey. 
 
I also hope to see you in Christchurch on the 8th of November at our AGM. I would love to talk in person about this stuff too!

Ani O'Brien | FSU Council Member