This year, nearly half of U.S. states passed laws imposing age verification requirements on online platforms. EFF has opposed these efforts, because they censor the internet and burden access to online speech. Though age verification mandates are often touted as 'online safety' measures for kids, the laws actually do more harm than good. They undermine the fundamental speech rights of adults and young people alike, create new barriers to internet access, and put at risk all internet users' privacy, anonymity, and security.
Age verification bills generally require online services to verify all users' ages—often through invasive tools like ID checks, biometric scans, and other dubious 'age estimation' methods—before granting them access to certain online content or services. Some state bills mandate the age verification explicitly, while others threaten platforms with liability for showing certain content to minors, leading to a potential chilling effect on free expression for all users.
EFF's answer: they can't. We call these bills 'implicit age verification mandates' because, though they might expressly deny requiring age verification, they still force platforms to either impose age verification measures or, worse, to censor whatever content or features deemed 'harmful to minors' for all users—not just young people—in order to avoid liability.
Age verification requirements are the wrong approach to protecting young people online. No one should have to hand over their most sensitive personal information or submit to invasive biometric surveillance just to access lawful online speech.
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