Canada has introduced Bill C-34, the Safe Social Media Act, proposed legislation that would create a new digital-safety framework and set a minimum age of 16 for holding a social media account. The bill would establish a Digital Safety Act and a Digital Safety Commission of Canada to administer rules covering social media services and certain AI chatbot services, putting age assurance at the center of how platforms would keep younger users off their services.
The age requirement is the bill’s centerpiece. As introduced, it would prohibit social media accounts for people under 16 and place age-verification obligations on covered operators, the mechanism by which a platform would have to establish that a user meets the threshold. The bill allows the proposed commission to exempt an operator from the requirement if it is satisfied the service has adequate safeguards for children, building in a route around a blanket rule.
Beyond the age floor, the bill sets out a set of duties for covered services. It would require operators to mitigate risks from harmful content, label synthetic or AI-generated content, and meet child-safety obligations, with the new commission empowered to enforce the framework. Bringing certain AI chatbot services into scope alongside social media reflects how the bill treats automated and synthetic content as part of the same online-safety problem.
The enforcement provisions are substantial. The bill proposes administrative monetary penalties of up to 10 million Canadian dollars or 3 percent of gross global revenue, whichever is greater, and criminal fines of up to 20 million Canadian dollars or 5 percent of gross global revenue for the most serious offences, giving the commission financial leverage over large platforms.
Canada joins a growing list of jurisdictions building age rules for social media. Australia has moved to require age verification for social media and bar users under 16, and within Canada the opposition has separately proposed trustworthy age-assurance technology to protect minors online, signaling cross-party attention to the issue even as approaches differ.
As a bill at an early stage, the Safe Social Media Act sets out proposed requirements that would take effect only if it is passed into law.
Sources: Parliament of Canada
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By Cass Kennedy
