On Sunday, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Communications Minister Anika Wells doubled the maximum penalty for systematic breaches of Australia’s social media minimum-age law, from $49.5 million to $99 million. The new ceiling lines up with the penalties under competition and consumer law.
The same announcement handed the eSafety Commissioner stronger powers. The regulator can now compel platforms to show what they have done to keep under-16s off their services, and demand information from third parties such as age-assurance providers and app stores.
Almost all of the platforms in question and under the microscope here are American. And Trump – along with his government – are keeping a close eye on it.
Last week, President Donald Trump threatened a 100 per cent tariff on any country that imposes a digital services tax on American technology companies. The threats came after the EU said it would impose exactly such a tax. Trump said some nations were “close to actually doing this” and that he would respond immediately, overriding existing trade deals.
The US and EU have until 4 July to finalise a trade agreement, and digital taxes are still a sticking point. The European Commission said it would “respond swiftly and decisively to defend its rights and regulatory autonomy”.
A digital services tax and a social media fine are different instruments. One takes a slice of revenue, the other punishes a breach of the law. But from Washington’s vantage point they’re in the same spirit. Both are foreign measures that fall on American companies, and the Trump administration has shown it will treat them as trade aggression.
The US House Judiciary Committee, chaired by Republican Jim Jordan, has already called Australia’s eSafety Commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, to testify about our new online safety laws. Jordan called her a “noted zealot for global take-downs” and pointed to the free-speech implications of the regime. Grant rejected the characterisation and said she would write to the committee.
This latest Albo salvo could yield real fines, too, given that the vast majority of youngsters are able to sidestep the social ban. Research led by the University of Newcastle, which tracked 408 children aged 12 to 16 before and after the ban took effect in December 2025, found more than 85 per cent of under-16s were still using restricted platforms three months in, most through their own accounts. The eSafety Commissioner’s own data puts about seven in 10 children as still holding accounts.
If compliance stays that low, the regulator now has both the powers and the higher $99 million ceiling to act. The question is: what happens the first time a US platform is fined under a law Washington has already called a free-speech problem, in a week when the President is threatening tariffs over exactly this kind of reach?
