Another Nation Just Banned Social Media For Children

Published: June 17, 2026

Phone, scrolling, television, popcorn — (Getty Images/Vladans)

By Movieguide® Staff

Britain is drawing a hard line.

“Social media is making our children unhappy and unsafe, and as a parent, as much as a Prime Minister, I just can’t let that go on anymore,” Prime Minister Keir Starmer said Monday, announcing a sweeping ban on social media for children under 16.

The new law would bar children from Snapchat, TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, and X, while messaging apps like WhatsApp and Signal remain accessible. Starmer billed it as going “further than any country in the world” to protect children online.

The government plans to bring the legislation before Parliament by Christmas, with protections expected in spring 2027. Beyond the blanket ban, under-16s would also lose access to livestreaming and stranger communication on gaming platforms, and under-18s would be barred from AI “romantic companions.”

“It’s not an easy thing to do,” Starmer acknowledged. “We haven’t rushed into it. We’ve looked carefully at the evidence, and we’ll have to adapt our approach as technology changes, learn from other countries which are taking similar steps.”

More than 116,000 people responded to a national consultation survey this spring. Over 83% of parents said the risks of social media outweigh the benefits, and 90% backed setting 16 as the minimum access age.

Australia passed a similar ban in December 2025, covering Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, X, Snapchat, and Reddit. The enforcement challenges have been real: Australia’s eSafety Commission found in March that 7 in 10 parents reported their child still had accounts on restricted platforms. Britain’s legislation would put the compliance burden on tech companies, threatening steep fines for failures.

“The decision has been resisted, and it will face resistance from some of the most powerful companies in the world,” Starmer said. “But we will take them on, and we will win, because the need for action could not be any clearer.”

The research behind the push is solid, and Movieguide® has been tracking it. Teens who spend more than two hours daily on social media are four times as likely to face emotional and behavioral problems. A randomized controlled trial found that limiting use to 30 minutes a day drove depression scores down more than 35% within three weeks. A University of Georgia study linked heavy adolescent social media use to weaker reading skills, reduced vocabulary development, and poorer attentional control.

Social media hits girls especially hard. Social psychologist and author Jonathan Haidt has argued that the platforms “take all the worst parts of middle school — social comparison, focusing on your looks, insecurity — and multiply them by ten.”

The benefits of waiting are specific: later access means less exposure to online predators and grooming, reduced contact with pornography and explicit content, better sleep that social media is engineered to steal, more time for in-person friendships that build real emotional resilience, and protection from the relentless social comparison that research ties directly to rising anxiety and depression in adolescent girls.

The UK government also announced a £132.5 million “Every Child Can” program to fund sports, art, and nature activities in schools as alternatives to the scroll.

Proverbs 4:23 says to guard your heart above everything else, because from it flows the rest of your life. Social media, by design, targets that gate in children before they’re equipped to man it. Giving kids more time to develop real identity, real judgment, and real community isn’t shelter from culture. It’s preparation.

Movieguide® has long argued that the goal for families isn’t avoiding culture, but engaging it wisely. Britain’s ban is the sharpest signal yet that the industry left to itself won’t protect your kids. Whether enforcement can match the ambition is the story still being written.

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