Malaysian families have varying views.
In Kuala Lumpur, Saravanan Ganasan and Jayaradha Veerasamy, whose children are 12 and 15, said they approve of the changes. They had already banned their kids from using social media, believing minors lack the psychological capacity to cope with it.
Devices are kept out of bedrooms, screen time is limited to common areas and their son is not allowed to lock his phone with a password.
“Exposure is what we fear,” Saravanan said. “The wrong kind of exposure will do damage to the mind.”
Aadhavan Saravanan, 15, said he believes he would be addicted to social media if allowed full freedom. “Social media is, like, a luxury and it’s not a necessity,” he said.
The couple said the restrictions have forced their children to develop offline life skills. Aadhavan reads books in a backyard mango tree and repairs broken household appliances, while their daughter cooks and does crafts.
“A lot of parents are very scared that children get bored,” Jayaradha said. “But boredom is actually very good because they start thinking out of the box.”
But Shaun Hew, in the Kuala Lumpur suburb of Cheras, said the new restrictions go too far.
Hew believes social media allow his kids to spend time productively, as long as there is proper adult oversight. His 11-year-old son uses platforms to learn cooking and his daughter, 14, uses YouTube for exam preparation.
He worries a sudden cutoff could cause teenagers to rebel and find unregulated ways to bypass internet blocks.
Some express concerns over privacy and safety.
Some critics said Malaysia’s decision could increase the risks of data privacy breaches and expand state surveillance.
“It is very much following the trend, but in a way that is raising alarms due to requiring a government ID for age verification,” said Benjamin Loh, social science lecturer at Monash University in Malaysia. He said social media companies could end up storing sensitive personal data without sufficient safeguards.
Loh said the decision also could unintentionally affect stateless individuals, undocumented residents and members of marginalised communities including LGBTQ+ people who rely on anonymity online for safety.
Without penalties on parents, families can easily bypass the law by creating accounts for their children, he added.
“This is a major gap that, unless regulators are willing to fix, will result in the law having little effect in stopping children from using social media,” he said.