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Australia bans social media for under 16s
(www.theverge.com)
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Most kids are not going to pay a subscription for a VPN, I don't think that would be as big of an issue as you think.
No, they're gonna download "free vpns" and get infected with malware and turn their device into part of a bot net.
Or use Tor and end up finding things worse than just "social media".
Are the government gonna ban those too?
Congrats, you now live in China where the all benevolent government have 24/7 surveillance to keep you safe.
There are free VPNs that are subsidized by payers and are legit (though most are not). Calyx and Proton to name two.
Also Tor is free, and the most popular site on the darknet is Facebook, so I dont think you're informed about the nature of Tor traffic.
Also here, where a VPN or proxy is a "must" for using the internet normally, there are also some ran by charities. But yeah, the omnipresence of shady free VPNs is very concerning.