On Monday, Florida became the primary state to effectively ban residents under 14 from having accounts on sites like TikTok and Instagram, enacting a strict social media law that can likely upend the lives of many young people.
The groundbreaking law, signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis, is one in every of the more restrictive measures the state has enacted to this point as a part of a growing nationwide effort to insulate young people from potential mental health and safety risks on social media platforms. The bill prohibits certain social networks from providing accounts to children under 14 and requires these services to shut accounts that the platform knew or believed belonged to underage users.
It also requires platforms to acquire parental consent before providing accounts to 14- and 15-year-olds.
At Monday’s news conference, DeSantis praised the measure, saying it will help parents navigate “difficult terrain” online. He added that “being buried” in devices all day just isn’t the most effective method to grow up.
“Social media harms children in many ways,” DeSantis said in an announcement. The latest law “gives parents greater opportunity to protect their children.”
DeSantis vetoed a previous bill that might have banned social media accounts for 14- and 15-year-olds, even with parental consent. The governor said the sooner bill would infringe on parents’ rights to make decisions about their children’s online activities.
Florida’s latest measure will almost definitely face constitutional challenges regarding young people’s rights to freely seek information and corporations’ rights to disseminate information.
Federal judges in several other states recently halted less restrictive web safety laws on free speech grounds in response to lawsuits brought by NetChoice, a tech industry trade group that represents corporations including Meta, Snap and TikTok.
For example, judges in Ohio and Arkansas blocked laws in those states that might have required some social networks to confirm users’ ages and acquire parental consent before providing accounts to children under 16 or 18. A federal judge in California has stopped a law in that state that might require some social networks and video game apps to default to the best privacy settings for minors and disable certain features reminiscent of autoplaying videos by default for those users.
In addition to age restrictions on social media, Florida’s latest law requires online pornography services to make use of age verification systems to forestall minors from accessing their platforms.
Apps like Facebook, Snapchat and Instagram have already got policies prohibiting children under 13 from using them. This is since the federal Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act requires some online services to acquire parental consent before collecting personal information – reminiscent of name, contact information, locations or selfies – from children under 13.
But state regulators say thousands and thousands of minor children could have arrange social media accounts by simply providing false dates of birth.
