FILE – Students work on a laptop computer at Stonewall Elementary in Lexington, Ky., Feb. 6, 2023. A bill aiming to protect kids from the harms of social media, gaming sites and other online platforms appears to have enough bipartisan support to pass, though whether it actually will remains uncertain.
The last time Congress passed a law to protect children on the internet was in 1998 — before Facebook, before the iPhone and long before today's oldest teenagers were born. Now, a bill aiming to protect kids from the harms of social media, gaming sites and other online platforms appears to have enough bipartisan support to pass, though whether it actually will remains uncertain.
Supporters, however, hope it will come to a vote later this month.
Proponents of the Kids Online Safety Act include parents' groups and children's advocacy organizations as well as companies like Microsoft, X and Snap. They say the bill is a necessary first step in regulating tech companies and requiring them to protect children from dangerous online content and take responsibility for the harm their platforms can cause.
Opponents, however, fear KOSA would violate the First Amendment and harm vulnerable kids who wouldn't be able to access information on LGBTQ issues or reproductive rights — although the bill has been revised to address many of those concerns, and major LGBTQ groups have decided to support of the proposed legislation.
Here is what to know about KOSA and the likelihood of it going into effect.
What would KOSA do?
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If passed, KOSA would create a “duty of care” — a legal term that requires companies to take reasonable steps to prevent harm — for online platforms minors will likely use.
They would have to “prevent and mitigate” harms to children, including bullying and violence, the promotion of suicide, eating disorders, substance abuse, sexual exploitation and advertisements for illegal products such as narcotics, tobacco or alcohol.
Social media platforms would also have to provide minors with options to protect their information, disable addictive product features, and opt out of personalized algorithmic recommendations. They would also be required to limit other users from communicating with children and limit features that “increase, sustain, or extend the use” of the platform — such as autoplay for videos or platform rewards. In general, online platforms would have to default to the safest settings possible for accounts it believes belong to minors.
“So many of the harms that young people experience online and on social media are the result of deliberate design choices that these companies make,” said Josh Golin, executive director of Fairplay, a nonprofit working to insulate children from commercialization, marketing and harms from Big Tech.
How would it be enforced?
An earlier version of the bill empowered state attorneys general to enforce KOSA's “duty of care" provision but after concerns from LGBTQ groups and others who worried they could use this to censor information about LGBTQ or reproductive issues. In the updated version, state attorneys general can still enforce other provisions but not the “duty of care” standard.
Broader enforcement would fall to the Federal Trade Commission, which would have oversight over what types of content is “harmful” to children.
Who supports it?
KOSA is supported a broad range of nonprofits, tech accountability and parent groups and pediatricians such as the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Federation of Teachers, Common Sense Media, Fairplay, The Real Facebook Oversight Board and the NAACP. Some prominent tech companies, including Microsoft, X and Snap, have also signed on. Meta Platforms, which owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, has not come out in firm support or opposition of the bill, although it has said in the past that it supports the regulation of social media.
ParentSOS, a group of some 20 parents who have lost children to harm caused by social media, has also been campaigning for the bill's passage. One of those parents is Julienne Anderson, whose 17-year-old daughter died in 2022 after purchasing tainted drugs through Instagram.
“We should not bear the entire responsibility of keeping our children safe online,” she said. “Every other industry has been regulated. And I’m sure you’ve heard this all the time. From toys to movies to music to, cars to everything. We have regulations in place to keep our children safe. And this, this is a product that they have created and distributed and yet over all these years, since the '90s, there hasn’t been any legislation regulating the industry.”
KOSA was introduced in 2022 by Senators Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., and Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn. It currently has 68 cosponsors in the Senate, from across the political spectrum, which would be enough to pass if it were brought to a vote.
Who opposes it?
The ACLU, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and other groups supporting free speech are concerned it would violate the First Amendment. Even with the revisions that stripped state attorneys general from enforcing its duty of care provision, EFF calls it a “dangerous and unconstitutional censorship bill that would empower state officials to target services and online content they do not like.”
Kate Ruane, director of the Free Expression Project at the nonprofit Center for Democracy and Technology, said she remains concerned that the bill's care of duty provision can be “misused by politically motivated actors to target marginalized communities like the LGBTQ population and just politically divisive information generally,” to try to suppress information because someone believes it is harmful to kids' mental health.
She added that while these worries remain, there has been progress in reducing concerns.
The bigger issue, though, she added, is that platforms don't want to get sued for showing minors content that could be “politically divisive,” so to make sure this doesn't happen they could suppress such topics — about abortion or transgender healthcare or even the wars in Gaza or Ukraine.
Sen. Rand Paul, R-K.Y., has also expressed opposition to the bill. Paul said the bill “could prevent kids from watching PGA golf or the Super Bowl on social media because of gambling and beer ads, those kids could just turn on the TV and see those exact same ads.”
He added he has "tried to work with the authors to fix the bill’s many deficiencies. If the authors are not interested in compromise, Senator (Chuck) Schumer can bring the bill to the floor, as he could have done from the beginning.”
Will it pass Congress?
Golin said he is “very hopeful” that the bill will come to a vote in July.
“The reason it has it has not come to a vote yet is that passing legislation is really hard, particularly when you’re trying to regulate one of the, if not the most powerful industry in the world,” he said. “We are outspent.”
Golin added he thinks there's a “really good chance” and he remains very hopeful that it will get passed.
Senate Majority Leader Schumer, D-N.Y., who has come out in support of KOSA, would have to bring it to a vote.
Schumer has backed the legislation but has not yet set aside floor time to pass it. Because there are objections to the legislation, it would take a week or more of procedural votes before a final vote.
He said on the floor last week that passing the bill is a “top priority” but that it had not yet moved because of the objections.
“Sadly, a few of our colleagues continue to block these bills without offering any constructive ideas for how to revise the text,” he said. “So now we must look ahead, and all options are on the table.”
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Associated Press Writer Mary Clare Jalonick contributed to this story from Washington D.C.
