Families deserve a fair shot at protecting children online, not more of the same
Australia just banned social media for kids under 16. Congress is debating how to regulate the smartphone apps our own children spend five hours a day using.
As a father of three young children who serves on the committee of jurisdiction in Congress, this debate is both personal and political. Social media corporations are attention-fracking our children. Parents deserve more power.
My bill, the Parents Over Platforms Act, gives parents that power. But Meta is lobbying hard against it. Mark Zuckerberg’s lobbyists are pushing, instead, for the App Store Accountability Act.
The bills are head-to-head in committee. It’s parents versus Meta. At stake is who should be trusted to watch out for children online.
My view: Parents should be trusted. Congress must force Facebook and the other apps — Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat — to be liable for respecting what parents decide is appropriate for their kids. The Parents Over Platforms Act achieves that in three ways.
First, from a family account, a parent sets up the app store account for their child’s smartphone. Next, for the app store account, the parent sets an indicator for their child’s age range. This age signal includes no personal information. It only transmits the child’s broad age range.
From then on, apps that provide different experiences based on a user’s age are liable to abide by that age signal. For example, pornography and gambling apps are prohibited for users under 18. Social media apps would be blocked for users under 13 based on existing online privacy protection laws, which I’m trying to make a minimum of 16.
By contrast, Meta’s preferred bill puts the burden on families and lets apps forgo proactive protections for kids. Instead of sending one set-and-forget anonymous age signal like in my bill, parents and children would have to identify themselves for each app, each time it updates.
That identification would require intrusive verification, like government IDs or facial scanning. Limited controls are in place to keep apps from misusing and selling that personal data, while the bill allows any app to request age data from the app store, even those with no need for age information like weather forecasts or calculators.
A court has already blocked a Texas law, the state-level version of Meta’s bill, from taking effect due to constitutionality concerns. The judge criticized not only its restraint on protected speech, but also its arbitrary exemption of certain apps. Pre-loaded, virtual reality and gaming content are all exempt. Meta’s lawyers are boosting a bill that its software engineers are ready to exploit.
If this sounds unworkable, that’s the point. Meta is waging a false flag operation. It knows its federal bill will immediately be litigated on free speech and privacy grounds, which will slow down, demoralize and disorient genuine reformers.
If ever enacted — even better. Families will throw up their hands in frustration. Consent fatigue and confusion will cement a status quo in which children are hooked on scrolling, while parents remain unaware of whom their kids are messaging or what they’re watching. Chatrooms and direct messaging pose some of the largest risks to online kids safety, making up nearly 90 percent of online sexual advances toward kids.
Meta is recruiting friends and targeting foes in this operation. It’s building a data center in Louisiana to curry favor with the Speaker of the House and readying millions for Super PACs to intimidate legislators. Congress must stop flinching from this hardball and start standing up for parents.
My legislation is bipartisan, co-led by another parent, Rep. Erin Houchin (R-Ind.), who is fed up with the reckless arrogance of the social media corporations. The Parents Over Platforms Act is a critical piece of legislation for reclaiming power for parents. They deserve easy-to-use tools to safeguard their children against the merchants and miners of digital dopamine.
By: Jake Auchincloss
Source: The Hill