April 24, 2026
JAKARTA – Online video sharing platform YouTube will start deactivating accounts owned by users under 16 years old in Indonesia and stopping advertisements targeting children, after it became the latest major digital platform to comply with the government’s new children online safety regulations.
During a live streamed press briefing in Jakarta on Wednesday, Communications and Digital Minister Meutya Hafid announced the video sharing platform’s compliance with the government’s Child Protection in Digital Space Regulation (PP Tunas) was formalized through a letter submitted by Google, YouTube’s parent company, on April 17.
According to the latter, the company had committed to adjust its platform to enforce a minimum user’s age of 16.
“The government appreciates that YouTube has delivered its letter of compliance,” Meutya said.
YouTube was among eight digital platforms the ministry classified as “high risk” for underage users, according to the framework of PP Tunas, which aims to better protect children from online harms such as pornography, gambling and addiction.
YouTube’s Asia-Pacific public policy head Danny Ardianto said the platform would shortly begin removing accounts owned by users aged younger than 16 and lowering its platform ads targeting children. However, the implementation will be carried out gradually, he added.
“This is still a work in progress, so we will disclose the total figures [of under-16 accounts deactivated] to the ministry later,” Danny said at the ministry’s press briefing on Wednesday.
Responding to Danny’s comment, Meutya said that some children “might be immediately affected, while others might not yet notice the changes”.
In a statement issued on April 17, YouTube said children under the age of 16 can download their data before their accounts are deactivated, while assuring that their profiles will still be available to them when they reach the minimum age requirement.
Danny also confirmed that YouTube Kids, the platform’s application specifically designed for child-friendly videos, would not be affected by YouTube’s compliance with PP Tunas.
“YouTube Kids is its own separate app […] and it does not even require an account,” he went on to say. “So, it’s different from what’s available in the main YouTube app.”
YouTube’s move comes after six of the eight platforms identified as having high-risk for children users complied with the government’s new child online protection regulation. Among the latest was video-based social media platform TikTok, which previously reported having removed 780,000 underage accounts, as of April 10.
Gaming platform Roblox is the remaining high-risk platform left to fully comply with the government’s regulation, with Minister Meutya saying the discussion between the platform and the ministry was still ongoing.
The ministry previously said Roblox had shown “partial cooperation” in complying with the regulation, as the platform had submitted plans for under-13 users to be able to play the sandbox platform offline.
A representative from Roblox separately said the platform would introduce additional controls for content and communications features for all players under 16 in Indonesia.
Google initially opposed the blanket ban for under-16 users, arguing in late March that YouTube already provides comprehensive parental supervision tools and content filters for children. The opposition pushed the communications ministry to issue a warning to the tech giant earlier in April.
Meutya welcomed the development on Wednesday, emphasizing that YouTube’s compliance signals growing alignment among global platforms with Indonesia’s child safety framework.
“This serves as an example for [other platforms] that if they are willing, they can certainly comply with the regulation,” the minister said.
The government’s restrictions on social media use for children under 16 came into effect on March 28 following the issuance of a communications and digital ministerial regulation serving as the technical guideline for PP Tunas.
The government gave digital platforms a three-month grace period until June to fall in with the regulation and submit self-assessments to determine their risk classification, particularly based on their safety for users under 16.