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Canada has introduced a bill that would ban social media for children under the age of 16.

Getting into it: The Safe Social Media Act, introduced Wednesday in the House of Commons by Culture Minister Marc Miller, would require platforms like Meta, Snapchat and TikTok to block users under 16 from creating accounts. Unlike Australia’s blanket ban, the Canadian bill would let companies earn an exemption by proving they have adequate safeguards to protect children, though platforms offering adult content would not qualify. Firms that fail to comply could face penalties in the millions or 3% of their global revenue.

AI chatbots are excluded from the ban but would face new obligations, including crisis-intervention protocols when users mention suicide or self-harm. Platforms would also have to remove non-consensual intimate images, including AI-generated deepfakes, within 24 hours of being flagged.

The bill would also create a new independent regulator, the Digital Safety Commission of Canada, to enforce the rules, though officials estimate it could take up to 18 months to stand up.

Miller framed the legislation as overdue, saying “the safety of children cannot be an afterthought” and warning earlier in the week that “kids are dying.” He argued that social media and AI chatbots are built to capture attention and have become a source of anxiety, isolation and depression, with the government pointing to engagement-based feeds, autoplay and endless scrolling as features that amplify harm, and adding that services have failed to keep pace.

The bill follows a February mass school shooting in British Columbia that killed eight people, including six young children, whose families have sued OpenAI, alleging it knew the suspect (who had used ChatGPT to discuss gun violence) posed a threat but did not warn police, prompting an apology from CEO Sam Altman.

This all comes as the bill lands days before a G7 summit in France, where Prime Minister Mark Carney is pushing allies to endorse a joint statement on children’s online safety, part of a global wave that began with Australia’s first-of-its-kind ban, which deactivated millions of teen accounts but left most children still online.