Toxic algorithms wouldn't let them go - now Australia wants an off switch

ByTiffanie Turnbull

Sydney

Warning: This article contains an account of living with an eating disorder

Varsha Yajman was already self-conscious about the way she looked when she joined social media as a 13-year-old.

Endless workout videos making impossible promises filled her feeds. Through the screen, girls she'd never met urged her to sign up to dangerous calorie challenges. Others proudly promoted their height and weight - even the number of times they had been sent to hospital - on their profiles in a form of twisted competition.

Every night as she fell asleep, Varsha would watch a stranger on the internet diarising what they'd consumed that day.

"I was like, 'I don't need to eat. I can just watch other people eat'," Varsha tells the BBC.

"I would find that I'd be down these really deep rabbit holes... it was like no matter how hard you tried to get out, you couldn't."

Now 24 and in recovery from anorexia, Varsha says she is still served weight loss content on social media - despite having every safety setting turned on, and an exhaustive list of banned words.

It is people like her the Australian government says it is trying to protect with a new suite of laws cracking down on big tech, which were introduced to parliament this week.

The centrepiece of their proposed reforms: an algorithm switch which would force social media platforms to let users turn off recommended content. The idea is that you would only see posts from accounts you follow.

It isn't the first government to try this, but existing algorithm controls are often transient and come with trade-offs in app functionality.

Australia has set out to make its legislation tighter to stop this. And it hopes its new laws – which would also impose a legal duty of care on online services – will help Australians become happier and healthier.

But critics are concerned Prime Minister Anthony Albanese's government has bitten off more than it can chew in its fight with big tech, while others, including the Trump administration, say the reforms threaten free speech.

Flynn Martin knows what it is like to be sucked into an algorithmic spiral.

Self-proclaimed misogynist influencer Andrew Tate and other manosphere figures started overwhelming the then-20-year-old's social media feeds about four years ago.

It was a time when Flynn, who was eventually diagnosed with bipolar disorder, was insecure, frustrated with his life and struggling with his mental health. He says he fell for the rhetoric.

He soon went viral in Australia for two videos: one ranting about whether it was OK to be a straight white male, and another where he criticised a date for her frozen yoghurt order.

"You find yourself in like a bit of an echo chamber... It's easy to get swept up in that," he tells the BBC.

"I really bought into the idea we were living in this matrix, we had this really negative system that was designed against you. And the only way to break out of it was becoming this alpha male character."

The Melbournian was only pulled from the manosphere after a period of psychosis and a hospital stay.

Nowadays, he finds it tough to look back at that version of himself: "While there's a bit of shame and embarrassment... I think there is a bit of empathy for that younger man."

Both Flynn and Varsha know social media alone isn't to blame for the worst chapter of their lives, but say it was a key factor.

Countless others have stories of being confronted by social media content they didn't seek out, and didn't want to see – and there's long been suspicions the algorithms curating these platforms are harming users.

Social media firms argue the potential risks are being overstated and that they already provide users with effective safety tools.

But research emerging from around the world has been sketching a different picture.