YouTube says it will be less safe for kids under Australia's social media ban

YouTube says Australia's "rushed" new laws to block teens from its platform will mean children will be less safe as its "robust parental controls" will be stripped away.

Parents will "lose their ability to supervise their teen or tween's account" such as content settings or blocking channels from 10 December when a social media ban for under-16s starts. Children will still be able to view videos but without an account.

Communications Minister Anika Wells responded by saying it was "outright weird" that YouTube was highlighting the dangers of its platform for children.

"If YouTube is reminding us all that it is not safe ... that's a problem that YouTube needs to fix," Wells said on Wednesday.

The platform's statement comes as Australia's internet regulator sets her sights on two little-known apps that teens have flocked to in the lead-up to the country's social media ban.

Lemon8, owned by the creators behind TikTok, and Yope are video and photo-sharing apps that have seen a rise in downloads recently, prompting eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant to ask them to self-assess if they fall under the ban.

The government reversed an exemption for YouTube from the ban in July, with the eSafety Commissioner saying it was "the most frequently cited platform" where children aged 10 to 15 years saw "harmful content".

In a statement on Wednesday, the video-sharing platform said it would comply but that the new law undermined more than a decade's work in building "robust protections and parental controls that families rely on for a safer YouTube experience".

"Most importantly, this law will not fulfil its promise to make kids safer online, and will, in fact, make Australian kids less safe on YouTube," wrote Rachel Lord, public policy senior manager at Google and YouTube Australia, adding that parents and educators shared these concerns.

She labelled the ban - which comes under the Social Media Minimum Age Act - as "rushed regulation that misunderstands our platform and the way young Australians use it".