Indonesia's Regulation Goes Global, Many Countries Follow Including Britain
Jakarta, CNBC Indonesia - The Indonesian Government through the Ministry of Communication and Digital Technology (Komdigi) established Government Regulation (PP) Number 17 of 2025 concerning the Governance of Electronic Systems Administration for Child Protection in Digital Spaces (PP TUNAS) in March 2025.
The regulation restricts access to social media for minors. The enforcement of this regulation was further announced by Communications and Digital Minister Meutya Hafid through the issuance of a derivative regulation from PP TUNAS in the form of Ministerial Regulation (Permen) Komdigi Number 9 of 2026 concerning the Governance of Electronic Systems Administration in Child Protection.
In the latest Permen, social media accounts for children under 16 years of age on several high-risk digital platforms will be deactivated starting 28 March 2026. In the initial phase, platforms affected include YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, Threads, X (Twitter), Bigo Live, and Roblox.
This latest regulation from the Communications Ministry has also become a trend across various parts of the world. Australia became the first country to firmly prohibit social media access for children under 16 years of age in December 2025.
Several countries besides Australia and Indonesia are reportedly developing similar regulations or beginning to implement them. These include Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Malaysia, Slovenia, Spain, India, and Britain.
Britain Follows Indonesia’s Regulation
Most recently, a Reuters report stated that Britain’s media and privacy regulator on Thursday (12/3) local time, pressured social media platforms to block minors from their services. The British regulator said social media platforms have failed to enforce minimum age policies on their applications.
Britain has already considered stronger measures for children’s access to social media. Following regulations in Australia and Indonesia, the local government is also proposing a ban on social media for children under 16 years old.
The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) and Ofcom have expressed increasing concern about algorithmic timelines that promote harmful and addictive content to minors.
“These online services are already well-known, yet they have failed to place child safety at the core of their products,” said Melanie Dawes, chief executive of Ofcom, according to Reuters on Thursday (12/3/2026).
“This situation must be changed immediately, or Ofcom will take action,” she added.
In the final implementation phase of Britain’s Online Safety Act, Ofcom stated that Facebook and Instagram owned by Meta Platforms, Roblox, Snapchat, TikTok owned by ByteDance, and YouTube owned by Google are required to demonstrate how they are tightening their age verification systems by 30 April 2026.
Popular platforms are also being asked to limit stranger access to contact children, make their timelines safer, and stop testing new products on minors.
Separately, the ICO also sent an open letter to the same platforms, requesting social media providers to adopt modern and advanced tools to ensure age detection. The ICO also requested that children under 13 years old be prohibited from accessing services not designed for them.
“Modern technology is already available to you, so there is no excuse,” said ICO chief executive Paul Arnold.
Ofcom can impose fines on companies that violate the regulations up to 10 per cent of the global revenue of these applications, whilst the ICO can impose fines of 4 per cent of annual global turnover.
The privacy regulator last month imposed a fine of nearly £14.5 million on Reddit for failing to introduce age verification on the platform and for processing children’s data in violation of applicable law.