The Florida Legislature approved this Thursday (22) a bill that prohibits children and adolescents from accessing social media.
The new law, which only awaits the approval of Governor Ron DeSantis, of the Republican Party, requires social media companies to verify the age of users. Furthermore, she mentions that such companies must also close and ban the accounts of individuals who are under 16 years of age. The legislation states that social networks must from now on use verification systems to prevent minors from creating new accounts.
Social networks will also have to permanently delete all data and personal information collected from minors' accounts that are closed. It also allows parents to civilly sue companies that do not follow the new rule.
Florida congressmen who support the measure argue that it aims to protect the mental health of young people, who can suffer from anxiety, depression and other mental disorders due to excessive and inappropriate use of social media.
Critics, on the other hand, claim that the law violates the First Amendment of the US Constitution, which guarantees freedom of expression, and that parents, not the government, should decide about their children's presence on social media. They also point out that the law raises concerns about data privacy, as users will have to provide personal information to be age verified.
The law does not directly mention which companies must comply with the new standard, however, according to information from the agency Reuterssocial networks that contain infinite scrolling tools, reaction metrics, videos with automatic playback and notifications, which encourage content consumption, will be subject to the new rule.
Governor DeSantis, who according to information from the American media has already expressed his concern about the possible violation of privacy rights by the law, said this week that he believes that social networks are harmful to children, but that the duty to supervise the consumption of social networks for them it belongs to the parents, showing caution with a law that could “override” this authority.
#Florida #passes #law #prohibiting #children #social #media #accounts