Australian father of teenage sextortion victim supports banning minors from social media

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Wayne Holdsworth, Banning Australian children under 16 Her son was banned from social media because he committed suicide after falling victim to an online blackmail scam.

Mac Holdsworth died at the age of 17 at the family home in Melbourne last year after a 47-year-old Sydney man allegedly claimed to be an 18-year-old woman and demanded money for an intimate photo he shared.

Since then, the grieving father has taken his tragic story to nearly 20 schools, warning students about the risks of social media.

“I have seen firsthand the damage social media can do. “I saw my son Mac being sexually harassed on social media,” Holdsworth said. “His mental health deteriorated rapidly.”

Online predators began approaching the teenager before his 16th birthday and his father believes such a ban could have saved his life.

Australia’s House of Representatives voted for such a ban on Wednesday and the Senate is expected to pass it into law soon.

Holdsworth said most of the 3,000 students he spoke to between the ages of 12 and 17 agreed with the ban on children under 16.

“They come up to me and say, ‘I’m so happy this is going to be implemented,'” Holdsworth said. “Now even children see that they will be protected from the predators that hunt them outside.”

He said that after the school speech on Monday, three girls approached him to say they were sexually blackmailing him. One had already handed over 2,500 Australian dollars ($1,600) of his parents’ money to a blackmailer.

Holdsworth said he was the first adult they trusted.

“The parent won’t know until the credit card statement comes out,” he said.

“So it’s common. “It happened last night, it will happen tonight too,” he added.

Holdsworth described the government’s plan to ban children under 16 from social media as “absolutely necessary for the safety of our children”.

But not all parents are convinced that banning young children from social media is the answer.

Critics say the law was rushed through Parliament without adequate scrutiny, won’t work, will create privacy risks for users of all ages and strip parents of the power to decide what’s best for their children.

They also argue that a ban would isolate children, deprive them of the positive aspects of social media, direct children to the dark web, make children too young for social media and reluctant to report the harm they encounter, and remove incentives for platforms to make online spaces safer. .

Independent Sydney MP Kylea Tink on Tuesday became the first member of the House of Representatives to speak publicly against a bill that would make platforms such as TikTok, Facebook, Snapchat, Reddit, $33 million due to systemic failures).

“As a mother of three young adults… I am very aware of the negative effects of social media and the challenges of parenting in this digital world,” Tink told Parliament. “But I also realize that my children are digital natives and are very knowledgeable about how these platforms work. “So I would encourage anyone joining this debate to make sure they are listening to the voices of young Australians when it comes to this decision-making process, rather than assuming the adults in the room know best.”

Tink was among 13 lawmakers who voted against the bill in the House of Representatives on Wednesday. They were stunned by the 102 MPs who voted for it.

Platforms called senate committee On Monday, it reviewed legislation to postpone the vote until after a government review of age assurance technologies is completed next June.

Monday’s four-hour committee meeting received 15,000 written submissions.

X Corp. told the committee that billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk’s platform had “serious concerns about the legality of the bill,” including its compatibility with the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

“There is no evidence that banning young people from social media will work and legislating it in the proposed form is extremely problematic,” X said.

Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, said the law was “inconsistent with what Australian parents have told us, which is a simple and effective way for them to set controls and manage their young people’s online experience.”

According to the bill, parental consent for children to use social media does not invalidate the ban.

Lizzie O’Shea, chief executive of Digital Rights Watch, which aims to protect Australians’ digital rights, said she was appalled by the process and limited timeframe the government had used to pass such important and contentious legislation.

He said he was very aware of the serious risks posed by social media platforms. “But personally I do not support the ban because I understand both the limits of that policy and the expert evidence from people working in this field. O’Shea spoke about the problems created by young people being excluded from these spaces.”

Their concerns centered on privacy, the negative effects of excluded children on mental health, and the possibility of young children finding ways to access social media spaces that would become even less child-friendly as a result of the ban.

“I am acutely aware of the dangers of major social media platforms operating a particular type of business model that prioritizes the extraction and exploitation of data over the public good or community building and the preservation of democracy,” he said.

Swinburne University digital media expert Belinda Barnet, who supports the ban, thinks she is in the minority among digital professionals.

“I love it because I think a lot of the social media platforms that are available right now are not appropriate environments for young children,” she said.

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