Initial figures showed platforms were taking meaningful action to remove underage users, Australia's eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant said. "It is clear that eSafety's regulatory guidance and engagement with platforms is already delivering significant outcomes," she said in a statement. Australia has required big platforms including Meta, TikTok and YouTube to stop underage users from holding accounts since the legislation came into force on December 10 last year. Companies face fines of Aus$49.5 million (US$33 million) if they fail to take "reasonable steps" to comply. Billionaire Mark Zuckerberg's Meta said last week it had removed 331,000 underage accounts from Instagram, 173,000 from Facebook, and 40,000 from Threads in the week to December 11. But Meta repeated its call for app stores to be required to verify people's ages and get parental approval before under-16s can download an app. (Bssnews)