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Canberra: Australia's Prime Minister Anthony Albanese reiterated social media's social responsibility on Wednesday following Meta's announcement to abandon its fact-checking programme. "Social media has a social responsibility," Albanese told a press conference held in Mount Isa of the country's northeastern state of Queensland, when responding to Meta's decision not to do fact-checking. Referring to the criticism that social media will make about Australia's decision and legislation to ban social media for those under 16, Albanese said that is "one that we don't resile from." "We will stand up for Australia's national interest," he said. The Prime Minister attributed the rise in mental health issues for young people to social media, adding "I say to social media they have a social responsibility and should fulfil it." Under the world-first law, children and teenagers under 16 in Australia will be banned from using social media from the end of next year. Social media companies could be fined up to 50 million Australian dollars (about $31.17 million) for failing to take "reasonable steps" to keep children under 16 off their platforms. There are no penalties for young people or parents who flout the rules. Facebook and Instagram owner Meta said on Tuesday that it was scrapping its third-party fact-checking program because expert fact-checkers had their own biases and too much content ended up being fact-checked, Xinhua news agency reported. Earlier in November 2024, the Bill to ban social media for children under 16 passed the Senate of Australia with bipartisan support. According to the local media, the Bill passed by a comfortable margin, with Labour and most of the Coalition voting together. However, most of the crossbench voted against the Bill. Social media companies were also prohibited from forcing users to provide government identification, including the Digital ID, to assess their age. "Messaging apps," "online gaming services," and "services with the primary purpose of supporting the health and education of end-users" were excluded from the ban, as were sites like YouTube that did not require users to log in to access the platform.

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Australian PM reiterates social media responsibility after Meta abandons fact-checking

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