Canada proposes social media ban for under-16s, targets AI chatbots

Canada moved to ban social media accounts for children under 16 unless platforms can prove they meet safety standards, bringing AI chatbots into the same regulatory net. The Safe Social Media Act, Bill C-34, would give Ottawa power to fine companies 3% of global revenue or C$10 million, whichever is greater, and create a Digital Safety Commission of Canada to enforce the rules.

Culture and identity minister Marc Miller cast the proposal as a child-protection measure, saying social platforms and AI systems are built to capture attention and have become a source of anxiety, isolation, depression and other mental-health pressures for young Canadians. The government said regulated services would have to identify harms on their platforms, adopt mitigation measures and improve accountability, transparency and consistency in the way they protect users, especially children.

The plan arrives as Canada joins a growing international debate over how far governments should go in limiting youth exposure to addictive feeds, algorithmic recommendations and increasingly persuasive AI systems. Ottawa pointed to Australia as a precedent: Parliament passed that country’s under-16 social-media law in late November 2024, and it was assented to on December 10, 2024, requiring certain platforms to take reasonable steps to prevent children under 16 from holding accounts.

The Canadian proposal also lands amid sharper public concern about AI after families affected by one of the country’s worst mass shootings sued OpenAI in March 2026. Later reporting said the families alleged employees had internally flagged the user’s gun-violence-related activity, a claim that intensified scrutiny of how chatbot companies respond to warning signs. Ottawa said the new law is meant to make social media services and AI chatbots safer before harm occurs.

The legislation would take time even if it advances smoothly. Officials said it could take about a year to move through Parliament and another 18 months to build and staff the regulator after it becomes law. The bill also fits a broader federal push on AI policy after Prime Minister Mark Carney announced Canada’s National Artificial Intelligence Strategy: AI for All on June 4, 2026. For parents, platforms and regulators, the central question is no longer whether Canada will act, but whether the new rules can be enforced in daily life without turning age checks and privacy tradeoffs into the next battleground.