Utah’s legislature has passed a new bill that would require app stores to verify the age and identity of all users, including adults. The bill now awaits signature by Governor Spencer Cox, who signed a similar bill last year that was blocked by a federal judge over First Amendment concerns.
The intention of the law seems to be a step towards restricting youth access to social media. Governor Cox has been an outspoken critic of social media use by teenagers and previously tried banning TikTok in his state, saying it intentionally designed its app to hook teens. Which is, well, what all social media apps aim to do to all demographics.
Governments across the world have sought to rein in the use of social media by teens, arguing they pose a particular threat during early childhood development and are vectors for bullying. Late last year, Australia passed one of the strictest internet crackdowns in the world, banning children under 16 from being on social media altogether, though the government there has admitted it may be tough to enforce. The UK’s recently passed Online Safety Act requires online platforms to prevent children from seeing age-inappropriate content.
Supporters of such laws say that teenagers are already restricted in accessing other harmful products, like alcohol and cigarettes, and social media should similarly be limited to adults who have more fully formed brains. Vivek Murthy, the U.S. Surgeon General under President Biden, argued last year that social media platforms should include warning labels highlighting potential mental health harms for adolescents. He conceded, however, that many youth report benefits from social media use, like finding belonging in like-minded communities. TikTok’s #BookTok community is an example of a rising trend amongst teens to use social media in a positive light.
The bigger concern amongst critics of laws requiring identity verification is that they threaten individual privacy by requiring everyone, including adults, to identify themselves in order to access platforms. GOP-led states including Florida, Texas, and Kentucky have recently implemented ID checks on adult websites, resulting in sites like Pornhub from ending operations in those states altogether rather than put users at risk.
The infamous hack of Ashley Madison in 2015, which resulted in the personal information of users of the adult website being shared online, demonstrates the potential harm of such laws. There are many reasons why one might not want to share their personal information with a website. Overreaching laws that target “adult content” are broad and could be used to target websites that a government does not like. Individuals may want to express themselves without fear of being identified.
“Utah already approved a similar bill focused on social media, and the courts rightly blocked it. The same thing is likely to happen here,” said Chamber of Progress Government Relations Senior Director Robert Singleton. “This bill invades everyone’s privacy and forces even adults to share sensitive data just to use their own devices. Instead of making the internet safer, this bill invites new risks and unintended harm.”
Even if these laws do hold up in court, they may prove just as effective as Prohibition, which was strongly influenced by religion (so much for separation of church and state) and merely pushed alcohol underground. Pornography will move to darker corners of the internet that do not verify age, do not follow the law, or perform any sort of content moderation. Counterintuitively, age verification laws could make the internet more dangerous—for both teens and adults.
If teens are to be restricted from using social media, that decision should probably rest with parents.
