Australia hasn’t issued any penalties against social media platforms over its ban for users under 16 despite one app allowing 24 age-verification retries a day.

Only 35 per cent of Australian under-16s have been blocked from creating accounts despite the ban first coming into effect on December 10 after a year-long notice period.

eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant has insisted that the watchdog was ironing out the flaws in the rollout but vowed to “hold the line and keep improving”.

Speaking in a Senate Estimates hearing on Wednesday evening, she shared examples of complications that eSafety had faced.

It included one app she insisted couldn’t be named for legal reason which used a third-party site which allowed children to regenerate their age verification scan 24 times a day.

Ms Inman Grant said that eSafety has had to keep on an external legal team to help grapple with the backlash.

The ban has prompted a string of legal threats, including two High Court challenges, with the next court date for a matter linked to tech billionaire Elon Musk’s app X on Thursday.

The legal cases against eSafety include those against their compliance actions, the ban entirely, and even the Commissioners powers.

The Federal court last week ordered X to pay a fine and legal costs to eSafety over a long-running legal battle about an infringement notice issued in 2023.

Justice Michael Wheelahan had ordered them to pay a $650,000 fine for wrongdoing with $100,000 court costs.

Ms Inman Grant said the Australia internet regular had been the only successful jurisdiction in the world which has had a win against X.

While eSafety have launched two cases against X, the platform has started six against the regulator.

“The majority have been ones X have taken against us challenging the use of our powers,” the commissioner’s office public servant Richard Fleming said.

“Most of them have had an outcome but there’s one that’s in court tomorrow.

“I think it gives you a sense of some of the stances that platforms take in relation to some of our powers.”

Mr Fleming said while eSafety didn’t have any ongoing infringement notice legal threats against other platforms, they were ready to act.

“You’ll get a sense from the way that we took this case (against X), that this is an important issue for us,” Mr Fleming said.

“So, if there are future non-compliance you would expect to see a similar response.”

Ms Inman Grant also confirmed no new apps have been added to the ban list but added that a string of lesser known apps like Lemon8 and Match.com had been engaging with eSafety.

The ban includes 10 platforms – YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, Threads, X, TikTok, Twitch, Snapchat, Reddit, and Kick.