Kids Online Safety Act may harm minors, civil society groups warn lawmakers

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by Lindsey Francy Nov 28, 2022 News
Kids Online Safety Act may harm minors, civil society groups warn lawmakers
Ranking Member Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) speaks during a Senate Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, Product Safety, and Data Security hearing on Protecting Kids Online: Snapchat, TikTok, and YouTube on October 26, 2021 in Washington, DC.Ranking Member Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) speaks during a Senate Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, Product Safety, and Data Security hearing on Protecting Kids Online: Snapchat, TikTok, and YouTube on October 26, 2021 in Washington, DC.

The bill that aims to protect children from online harm was opposed by dozens of civil society groups.

The American Civil Liberties Union, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Fight for the Future and Wikimedia Foundation were some of the groups that wrote to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.

The bill would establish responsibilities for websites that are likely to be accessed by kids to act in the best interests of users who are 16 or younger. The platforms are responsible for the risk of physical or emotional harm to young users, including through the promotion of self-harm or suicide.

The bill would make it mandatory for sites to default to more private settings for users under the age of 16. It would require tools for parents to track the time their kids are spending on certain sites and give them access to some information about the platform so that they can address potential harm. It is necessary for sites to let young users know when parental tools are in use.

Several groups that advocate for the rights of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer community wrote a letter on Monday warning that the bill could backfire.

The groups wrote that the KOSA would require online services to prevent a set of harms to minor, which is an instruction to use broad content filters to limit access to certain online content

State Attorneys General trying to make political points about what kind of information is appropriate for young people are some of the pressures online services would face. At a time when books with LGBTQ+ themes are being banned from school libraries and people providing healthcare to trans children are being accused of'grooming', KOSA would cut off another vital avenue of access to information for vulnerable youth.

At a time when debates over parental control of what is taught in school, specifically as it relates to gender identity and sexual orientation, have come to the forefront, the bill has gained traction.

Prescriptive parental controls could be harmful to children in abusive situations, according to the KOSA opponents.

The groups said that KOSA could subject teens who are experiencing domestic violence and parental abuse to additional forms of digital surveillance and control that could prevent them from reaching out for help or support. KOSA could jeopardize young people's access to end-to-end encrypted technologies, which they depend on to access resources related to mental health and to keep their data safe from bad actors, if they create strong incentives to filter and enable parental control over the content minor can access.

The groups are concerned that the bill will encourage sites to collect more information about children to verify their ages and place further restrictions on children's accounts.

They wrote that age verification may require users to provide platforms with personally identifiable information such as date of birth and government-issued identification documents, which can threaten users' privacy, and chill their willingness to access sensitive information online because they cannot do so anonymous. Congress should focus on ensuring that all users, regardless of age, benefit from strong privacy protections by passing comprehensive privacy legislation.

The groups said the legislation waslaudable but that it would fall flat on its face.

We encourage members of Congress to work toward solutions that protect young people's rights to privacy and access to information and their ability to seek safe and trusted spaces to communicate online if KOSA is not moved forward this session.

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