The UK's YouTube ban reveals what governments still don't understand about protecting kids online

The UK government has announced that a social media ban will come into force for those under the age of 16, blocking them from creating accounts on a variety of popular apps.

It will cover a range of platforms, including Facebook, X, TikTok, Snapchat, and Instagram. It also comes soon after, and is an extension of, the UK government’s age-verification system designed to protect children from harm online.

While many parents will welcome the news, eyebrows will have been raised at the inclusion of YouTube in the list of platforms the UK government will restrict for under-16s.

YouTube, unlike the other platforms, can have genuine educational and entertainment value, so why has it fallen foul of the ban hammer?

Here’s the likely situation, and why it perfectly illustrates the wider issue with current efforts to make the digital world safer.

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By  Taylor Kerns

Learning from Australia

It’s already happening

The UK government’s ban isn’t the first of its kind, with a very similar system already in place in Australia, which was introduced in 2025. The UK will be using Australia’s system as a template, according to the government.

In the UK, the ban will restrict:

User-to-user platforms, whose purpose is to enable social interaction and which allow users to post material, alongside algorithms. Because we want to ensure the ban doesn’t include educational services, e-commerce platforms, or music streaming, there will be a narrowly defined list of exemptions to the definitions, which will be kept under review.

YouTube is social media?

Not according to Google

When Australia announced the social media sites that would be banned for under-16s, it did not include YouTube. However, it backtracked later and added the platform to the list.

At the time, Australia’s eSafety Commissioner called YouTube the most frequently cited platform where young teenagers saw harmful content.

YouTube is not usually considered a social media platform, and YouTube made the claim when the Australian government added it to the banned list.

However, comments and — more importantly — algorithmic control are a major part of why it’s considered one.

“Algorithm” is probably the most important keyword to take away from both Australia’s and the UK’s social media bans, although governments aren’t talking about it with clarity. Hidden towards the end of the press release is an important statement:

Real-time content makes harmful material harder to moderate, and algorithmic feeds can intensify exposure to dangerous, distressing, or overly engaging material.

Anyone who regularly uses YouTube will know how effective the algorithm can be at suggesting content based on what you’ve already watched, and how aggressive the comments below the video can become.

Australia’s eSafety Commissioner used YouTube’s algorithmic expertise and how it drives engagement and pushes new recommendations as one of the reasons it had to be included in the ban. The UK seems to agree.

What about the good things on YouTube?

Is it really going to be banned?

Leaving aside Shorts, YouTube can be a source of incredible educational content, genuine entertainment, and videos that are good for kids’ growth and understanding of the world.

Banning under-16s from the platform will surely take away those benefits. Here’s where nuance is important, and where we see how the UK government has left crucial facts and guidance out of its public announcement.

In Australia, YouTube Kids is not part of the ban. If the UK follows the same formula, it will also be excluded.

YouTube is also still able to be viewed by under-16s in Australia, they just won’t be allowed to have an account, which will take away the ability to engage with comments, upload their own videos, or be subject to YouTube’s personal profile and viewing habit orientated algorithm.

While a YouTube ban initially sounds like it will also deprive kids of the good side of the platform, in reality, its inclusion is due to the similarities that YouTube’s algorithm has with TikTok, X, and Instagram.

That’s the problem, not that anyone in the UK government thought to make it clear now, when attention on the ban is at its most intense.

Kids will still be able to watch YouTube through a browser, just not be monitored and controlled in the same way they would with an account.

Marianna Spring, the BBC’s social media investigation correspondent, wrote about why this matters, and again, it’s about the algorithm:

What I find time and time again is how the harmful impact of the sites comes down to their design — and what their algorithmic systems reward and push to users.

Teenagers have told me on several occasions that what they want is more control over what they see — and that when they use the in-built tools to indicate they don’t want to see violent or hateful content, they’re still pushed it several days later.

How will it work?

Same as the old idea

It’s impossible for anyone to say they don’t think children should be better protected online, or that social media platform algorithms have the potential to cause harm by driving problematic content to them.

However, while improving safety around these things is admirable, as is the UK government’s pledge not to make it the sole job of parents, the issue will be how the ban will work.

Again, like YouTube’s inclusion, the UK government hasn’t provided much information on this yet.

Looking to Australia, platforms were required to deactivate accounts held by those under 16, and take reasonable steps to ensure those signing up for new accounts, or using existing ones, were over 16.

It means it will fall on adults to prove they are over 16 through age checks to use these platforms.

The UK has already implemented an online age-check requirement, which apps like X and Reddit must use to stop children accessing content that may not be suitable.

Nothing has been learned from experience

Same story, new way of telling it

I was surprised to see that YouTube was added to the list of banned social media in the UK. It was only after digging deeper that the real reason it has been included became clear.

Although only one aspect of the latest public announcement from the UK government, it highlighted the wider problems with it, and with the age-verification system that’s already in place. It’s not really the apps, it’s the algorithms.

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Understanding why and how YouTube’s supposed ban will affect kids and parents is also important. They shouldn’t have to do extensive research to understand the implications.

It, like all the other platforms, is just a name on a list at the moment, collected under the word “banned.” That’s not helpful to anyone, particularly parents trying to see what’s actually being done.

It’s evidence that, once again, the government has done a poor job at explaining its plan properly to people who will have to live with it.

The government’s eagerness to show it’s doing something about digital safety will have left parents and kids with more concern than reassurance.

Poor communication ruins good intentions

A bad start is hard to overcome

The government’s substandard communication about why adults have been, and will continue to be for even more sites, asked to verify their age has been illustrated to me since Apple added an age verification system to iOS in the UK.

While a neat implementation, I’ve been asked multiple times if the alert was a scam, highlighting Apple and the government’s poor communication around it.

All this comes before questions about the tools platforms will use to verify age and the data privacy implications that come with them.

There are good intentions behind the UK’s social media ban.

But by not explaining how it will work in reality at the announcement, failing to recognize that nuances are important, and not pushing tech companies to change their approach to safety and algorithms over online age checks, it seems the UK has learned nothing from Australia’s experience, or its own age-verification debacle.