India Debates Social Media Age Restrictions for Teens Amid Global Concerns

• Indian officials are publicly discussing age restrictions for social media access, posing a potential challenge to Big Tech in a major market.
• Parliamentarian Lavu Sri Krishna Devarayalu plans a private member's bill to bar children under 16 from social media accounts, aiming for data privacy and protection from exploitation.
• Such a move in India, the world's most populous nation, would significantly impact platforms like Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, and X, which have hundreds of millions of users there.
• Devarayalu's proposed bill, the Social Media Age Restrictions and Online Safety Bill, suggests penalties up to 2.5 billion rupees or 5% of a company's global revenue for non-compliance.
• The debate follows Australia's under-16 social media ban and similar considerations in Spain, France, the UK, and the Netherlands, highlighting growing global concern over online harms to children.