World News for Students of English

20-07-2026 07:00

In December, Australia started a new law that stops children under 16 from using social media. The government wanted to protect the mental health of young people. But six months later, the law is not working well.

Studies show that most kids can still easily open and use accounts on Snapchat, Instagram, and YouTube. The tech companies don’t check the age of their users carefully. Children can lie about their age, or they can ask their parents to help them pass the face checks. The special computer programs which try to guess a user’s age don’t work well either.

Now, the government is very angry with the big tech companies. They doubled the fines for companies which don’t follow the rules. Other countries in the world are watching Australia to see if they should make similar laws.

Difficult words: mental health (how you feel in your mind, how happy you are, and how well you cope with everyday life and stress), face check (using a camera or special computer software to look at a person’s face to check who they are or how old they look), fine (money you must pay when you break a rule or law).

You can watch the original video in the Level 3 section.