Raise social media age to 16
Petitioners ask the Government to raise the minimum age for social media access to 16 with mandatory age verification and bar sharing of youth data collected, including via age checks. The government responds it is committed to child online safety, noting prior online‑harms and privacy bills died and it is reviewing Bills S‑209 and C‑216.
Why we would sign this petition
- Raising the access age to 16 would reduce early exposure to harmful content and aligns access with the petitioners’ child‑safety concerns.
- Mandatory age verification and enforcement would create a clear legal duty for platforms to block underage users and be accountable for compliance.
- Securing privacy for under‑18s, including banning sharing of age‑check data, would limit firms’ use of minors’ data and reduce commercial targeting.
Why we wouldn’t sign this petition
- Mandatory age checks and enforcement may be difficult to deploy and easily bypassed, raising doubts about effectiveness and added costs.
- Raising the minimum access age to 16 restricts teens’ autonomy and could push them toward unregulated services or private channels.
- Banning sharing of minors’ data, including age‑verification data, might complicate legitimate uses such as safety measures or parental controls.
The summary and both sets of reasons are AI-generated from the petition and given equal weight. Claims are the petitioners’ own; consult the official record for the full text.
Official petition
PETITION TO THE GOVERNMENT OF CANADA Whereas: Smartphones have become a direct gateway to harmful content for Canadian children, with most owning devices by age 12 according to MediaSmarts; Algorithm-driven social media platforms designed to maximize engagement are addictive, damaging children's mental and emotional health; Canadian youth are facing a growing mental health crisis from social media use, and this is placing increasing strain on our healthcare system and social services; Parents face significant challenges in controlling their children's access to social media across multiple devices and platforms; and Australia has enacted legislation establishing a minimum age of 16 for social media access, with similar measures being considered by New Zealand, Sweden, and Spain, demonstrating growing international recognition of this issue. We, the undersigned citizens and residents of Canada, ask the Government of Canada to: 1. Raise the social media age to 16 using mandatory age verification, and enforce media company compliance using effective measures; 2. Secure privacy rights for youth under 18 to prevent social media companies from sharing data collected on kids - including data collected by the age-verification technologies used to deny underage kids access to their platforms.
Government response
Response by the Minister of Canadian Identity and Culture and Minister responsible for Official Languages Signed by The Honourable Steven Guilbeault The Government would like to thank the petitioners for expressing their concerns regarding the important issue of protection of young people online, especially regarding social media use. The Government agrees that children should have an age-appropriate experience online and wants to ensure that the best solution is put forward to keep children safe online. In the previous legislature, the Government introduced online harms legislation. The legislation proposed to create the Online Harms Act(the “Act”), which aimed to promote online safety by reducing exposure to harmful content on social media services, with a special emphasis on protecting children. The proposed Online Harms Act would have imposed three statutory duties that establish minimum standards that services must meet to ensure the safety of Canadians online: Duty to Act Responsibly; Duty to Protect Children; and Duty to Make Certain Content Inaccessible. The Duty to Act Responsibly would have established a standard of conduct that social media services must follow to ensure the safety of users on their platforms and to create more transparency and accountability about how they deal with harmful content. The Duty to Protect Children would have required social media services to provide special protections for children online, such as the integration of age-appropriate design features on their platforms. The Duty to Make Certain Content Inaccessible would have required social media services to expeditiously remove two categories of content from their services: Content that sexually victimizes a child or revictimizes a survivor, and Intimate content communicated without consent. The Act also would have created a new Digital Safety Commission to oversee and enforce the Act; a Digital Safety Ombudsperson to advocate for and support victims and a Digital Safety Office to support both administratively. Part of the Commission’s mandate would have been to: enforce the removal of content that sexually victimizes a child or revictimizes a survivor and intimate content communicated without consent; promote societal resilience to harms online and set new standards for online safety; and develop educational resources for the public, including children and parents. Overall, the Commission would have been able to enact a range of guidelines and regulations under the three duties. In making these guidelines and regulations, the Commission must have taken a range of factors into account, which includes the privacy rights of users, including children. Although the proposed legislation died on the Order Paper in January 2025, the Government’s commitment to protect children and address online harms remain. The Government also previously introduced additional legislation which proposed to create the Digital Charter Implementation Act, 2022, which also died on the Order Paper. That legislation would have modernized the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act, Canada’s federal private sector privacy law, to provide Canadians with greater control over their personal information, clear rules for organizations on handling personal information, and a stronger framework for consequences for non-compliance. The bill proposed to establish added protections for children by deeming all personal information of minors to be “sensitive.” As a result, the personal information of minors would have attracted stronger protections in the bill, including that: organizations would need to use express consent when collecting, using, or disclosing the information of minors; organizations would need to consider carefully whether their reason for collecting, using or disclosing the information of minors – and their way of doing so – is appropriate; and, stronger security safeguards would need to be employed to protect the information of minors. That legislation would have also introduced an enhanced right to deletion of personal information for minors and the ability for parents to exercise the rights and recourses of the law on behalf of their children. Currently, the Government is carefully examining two pieces of legislation aimed at protecting children online: Bill S-209 and Bill C-216. Bill S-209 is an Act to restrict young persons’ online access to pornographic material, by requiring sites to implement age assurance measures. Bill C-216 (Protection of Minors in the Digital Age Act), among other things, proposes to impose a Duty of Care on online platforms and requires them to implement certain safeguards on their services. Overall, the Government is committed to working with Parliament, stakeholders and Canadians to develop the best possible solution to protect Canadians – especially children – from harm online.