Australia includes Amazon's Twitch in ban on social media for teenagers, Pinterest excluded

The Australian internet regulatory agency announced on Friday that it will include Amazon's live streaming service Twitch in the upcoming ban on social media for teenagers, but will not add the image-sharing platform Pinterest to the list. Starting from December 10th, Australia will become the first country in the world to ban the use of social media for those aged 16 and below, with companies facing fines of up to $49.5 million Australian dollars for not taking "reasonable steps" to comply with the ban. The eSafety Commissioner stated that Twitch meets the criteria for social media services as it is primarily used for live streaming and interactive content sharing, allowing users to communicate with others. Twitch plans to deactivate all accounts of users aged 16 and below starting from January 9th, and will prohibit new underage users from creating accounts after the ban comes into effect the following month.