Google to use age assurance technology to identify underage accounts in Canada

Google says it will begin gradually rolling out age assurance technology in Canada in the coming days, using artificial intelligence to identify underage users.

The company said its age-estimation model uses signals already associated with an account, including the types of information a user has searched for and categories of YouTube videos they have watched. Accounts identified as belonging to underage users will receive additional protections, including safeguards on content recommendations.

Adults who are incorrectly identified as under 18 will be able to verify their age with options including government identification or a selfie, Google said.

Jeanette Patell, director of government affairs and public policy at Google Canada, said in a Monday blog post that the company will carefully monitor progress as it expands the technology's availability. She said Google will not collect information beyond what is already associated with a user's account.

Patell said age assurance technology is becoming more widely available and that other companies have increasingly adopted it in recent months. She said responsibility should rest with individual service owners, including developers, publishers and app creators, because they know their users and services best, rather than with a universal system that decides users' ages.

The growing use of age assurance technology comes as governments, including Canada's, consider social-media age restrictions. Meta has already begun using AI in Canada to identify underage users and place them in teen accounts. In September, the company said it would expand testing of the technology to countries outside the United States, including Canada.

Meta uses context clues such as birthday celebrations to identify accounts that may belong to underage users. In May, it said it would add visual analysis, using AI to scan photos and videos for visual clues to a user's age.

Meta promised child-protection measures, including stronger efforts to identify underage users, as part of a recent major legal settlement in the United States. The company has confirmed those changes will not come to Canada.

Google's announcement follows the Liberal government's introduction of digital safety Bill C-34. The legislation has not become law and would require social-media platforms to at least temporarily block children under 16 from accessing their services. The government has not decided how age verification would work and has said it will consult platforms on specific methods.

Australia became the first country to implement social-media age restrictions in December, requiring platforms to take reasonable steps to keep children under 16 from using their services. Its law does not set age-verification standards.

In the United Kingdom, legislation lists seven methods to verify age for legal access to adult content. They include facial age estimation by a third-party service using a live image, a digital ID, or verification through a credit card, mobile network operator or bank. The law also permits age estimation through email by examining where an email address has been used previously.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 14, 2026.