Snapchat Finds Gaps In Australia’s Social Media Law – MediaNama

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
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