March 21, 2026 11:00am by David Farrar

Online harm for youth report

The Education Select Committee released a report into harms online and young people. They found:

That the Government establish an independent national regulator for online safety in New Zealand
That the Government progress its consideration of restricting social media access for under-16-year-olds,
Ban “nudify” apps and prohibit the creation and distribution of non-consensual
deepfake sexual imagery

The last recommendation. is sensible, and I doubt anyone opposes it.

On balance I support restricting social media for under 16 year olds, so long as it canoe done in a way that doesn’t require NZers to scan in their ID to use social media.

I don’t support a government regulator for the Internet. The Australian version has become a monster. We have Netsafe which does a good job, and CERT.