Snapchat Finds Gaps In Australia’s Social Media Law

Even as Spain‘s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez says that the country plans to implement a social media ban for under-16 Spaniards online, Snapchat has taken a position that is at odds with Australia’s social media ban for under-16 users, as per a recent blog post.

The California-headquartered app argues that Australia’s approach to teens’ social media access, with its now-effective Social Media Minimum Age (SMMA) law, has gaps which could undermine the goal of the law. Interestingly, the messaging app even claims that it is not a platform that should fall within the Australian law’s purview for age restrictions.

Interestingly, Snapchat’s take on the social media ban comes in the wake of Australia’s eSafety commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, telling reporters that she was looking for ‘systemic issues’ with the SMMA rollout.

1) Snapchat claims it is not an ‘in-scope’ social media platform

“We fundamentally disagree that Snapchat is an in-scope age-restricted social media platform,” reads the blog post. The California-headquartered platform says that it is primarily a messaging app and that cutting under-16 users from Snapchat will not be beneficial in any way. Essentially, Snapchat is saying here that it is a messaging platform that should not fall within the Australian SMMA legal scrutiny ring for compliance-related to age restrictions.

Previously, Snap and Google-owned YouTube have argued that they are not social media companies in the first place. However, both platforms have also publicly stated that they will comply with Australia’s social media minimum age (SMMA) law.

One must note here that despite positioning itself as a messaging platform, Snapchat shares key features with regulated platforms. This includes algorithmic content delivery, disappearing media, and mass user engagement tools.

2) What does Snapchat think about Australia’s social media ban?

“We… don’t believe an outright ban for those under 16 is the right approach,” Snapchat says. “We believe it’s important to engage constructively and suggest ways to improve its implementation and reduce negative unintended effects,” it adds.

This clearly indicates that Snapchat does not favour the Australian government’s approach. However, the messaging app says that engaging constructively with the Australian administration and reducing any unintended negative effects is necessary. This, it says, can be achieved through app store-level age verification of users.

3) ‘Technical limitations to accurate age verification’

Snapchat says that the Australian government’s own trial, published in 2025, found that available age estimation technology was only accurate to within 2-3 years on average. 

This essentially means that some teens aged less than 16 may be able to bypass protections, while others over the age of 16 may inaccurately lose access. Pertinently, there have been some news reports since the Australian ban came into effect that highlight teenagers easily bypassing Snapchat’s facial age estimation checks.

Notably, Snapchat’s argument hinges on a contradiction: that age verification technology is too inaccurate to rely on, yet reliable enough to form the basis for sweeping app store-level enforcement. What’s missing is proof that either system — their own or Apple/Google’s — meaningfully protects under-16 users.

4) ‘App-store-level age verification a must’

Notably, Snapchat has advocated for this at least two times:

• Evan Spiegel – the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Snap Inc. – wrote an opinion piece in The Hill on May 1, 2025, explicitly advocating for verification of users at the app store level itself.
• And in November 2025, Snapchat once again reinforced its stand in favour of app-store-level age verification when posting about the implementation of Australia’s social media law.

In the current blog post, Snapchat contends that verification of users at the app-store level alone can “strengthen” the safety of the “entire digital ecosystem”, including unregulated apps in Australia.

The messaging app says that app-store-level scrutiny provides “more consistent age signals for each device”, ensuring that under-16 users are kept out and eligible users aren’t inaccurately ousted from online access.

“We’re advocating for app store-level age verification not because we support the U16 ban, but because if this policy is going to exist, it should be implemented in a consistent way that is most likely to have more upside and fewer downside risks,” the California-headquartered app remarks.

However, one must note that app-store-level verification ultimately centralises power further under the likes of Apple and Google. And this, in turn, has major implications for market control and user privacy, as well as accountability.

5) Snapchat says teens may use other apps, but has no data to back it

Snapchat is apparently concerned that teenagers below 16 years of age in Australia may turn to alternative, unregulated messaging services that offer less protection. However, the popular app does not have any numbers or statistics to back its own claims.

“While we don’t yet have data to quantify this shift, it’s a risk that deserves serious consideration as policymakers evaluate whether the law is achieving its intended outcomes,” the messaging app argues in the blog post. Here, Snapchat offers a hypothetical migration risk without data, deflecting from its own influence over youth behaviour and engagement incentives.

6) Snapchat claims it disabled over 400,000 accounts

“As of the end of January 2026, we have locked or disabled over 415,000 Snapchat accounts in Australia,” the Spiegel-led app claims. “We continue to lock more accounts daily,” it adds. However, Snapchat has offered no insight into whether under-16 users are simply switching to new accounts in response to the blocking

Hence, Snapchat’s strategy with respect to Australia is amply clear: comply, but also criticise and try to reframe the narrative, all the while protecting the core engagement metrics.

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