Utah Passes First US App Store Age Verification Law

Utah has become the first U.S. state to pass legislation requiring app store operators to verify users' ages and obtain parental consent for minors downloading apps.

The App Store Accountability Act adds to a wave of children's online safety bills advancing through state legislatures nationwide. Similar legislation has faced legal challenges, with many being blocked in courts. A comparable federal bill failed last year amid free expression concerns.

The approach shifts verification responsibility to mobile app stores rather than individual websites, a move supported by Meta, Snap, and X in a joint statement urging Congress to follow suit. "Parents want a one-stop shop to verify their child's age and grant permission," they stated. Critics, including Chamber of Progress, warn the law threatens privacy and constitutional rights. A federal judge previously blocked a similar Utah law over First Amendment concerns.

Sister Wives

[Sean Clifford]

Does this law also apply to sister-wives under the age of consent?

That hasn't bothered Utahans que estan Mormon previoso.

Re:

[Sean Clifford]

More than 0.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

The US sounds like such a religious mess.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

Total shitshow.

Re: Sister Wives

[vbdasc]

Not at all. They must obtain the permission of their husband, rather than their father. What is even more important is that it applies to all ages, rather than only underage wives.

I approve!

[dskoll]

If the age verification only applies to apps, it means web sites will stop creating stupid apps that are really just wrappers around web sites, and start making their product work in a normal web browser. Unintended consequences FTW!

Re:

[mysidia]

That would suggest the App store then has to verify age before allowing access to a "Web browser", since Web browser can be used to access age-restricted content

Re:

[Smonster]

I guess the devils in the details. Your take could be true; but it could also carve out programs which come preinstalled, are unable to be deleted, and are unavailable to download from the App Store. Frankly, I’m only mildly curious as I moved out of theocratic Utah years ago.

Prosecute parents for password sharing.

[tacarat]

Kids can only do it because the parents don't monitor what's going on. They won't go that route because it's bad for getting reelected.

Sideloading?

[Kernel Kurtz]

I wonder if lawmakers know what it is...

Im sure

[Slashythenkilly]

Age verification is as hard to get around as a speed bump. Computers are stupid compared to kids and most adults.

Re:

[DrMrLordX]

Age verification is about plausible deniability. It's the modern equivalent of putting nudie rags in brown bags at the newsstand and requiring ID to buy one. It wasn't hard to get your "cool" buddy who's a senior in hs to buy one and share with the sophomores etc. Or to find Dad's stash of porn at home or whatever.

Re:

[DrMrLordX]

Pretty sure nobody can sue unless it's shown that the app store doesn't require an age verification. Which is actually quite mild since older laws against prurience could lead to criminal action against the offending storefront.

Re:

[cmseagle]

Age verification is as hard to get around as a speed bump.

I don't know what roads are like where you live, but speed bumps aren't usually particularly easy to avoid. Unless you want to go off-roading, I guess (which would probably slow you down even more, and might scare the pedestrians).

PII to the worst people

[fishfrys]

It seems like Utah is forcing citizens to give PII to the people we'd all least like to have it. Probably easy to bypass for those we'd like to help avoid these sites and a honeytrap for those who're trying to be honest. Even in the old days, we all got our hands on a Penthouse or Hustler. They didn't require the purchasers to put their SSNs into a database, let alone one owned by criminals.

Score for App Store providers

[misnohmer]

They get to now have people fill out detailed personal information, social security, banking information, collect biometrics, location tracking, maybe even require sending in a blood sample for age analysis and DNA sequencing - all in the name to ensuring the user is an adult. Then of course sell that to the merchants to focus advertising and set prices to extract maximum value out of their products.

Utah proudly states

[bleedingobvious]

...it has ZERO FRICKEN CLUE about how technology works. But that's perfectly fine because feelings.

Next up, there'll be laws demanding back doors in everything. And a law demanding the Moon be rotated once a year.

If you've read the act

[NotEmmanuelGoldstein]

... parental consent for minors ...

Do Meta/Alphabet/X/ByteDance need parental approval to sell this data? Do they need to provide any encryption of, or insurance on, this data? Are there mandated time-limits and deletion procedures about storing this data? Then, there's a legal conflict: Utah is demanding corporations collect PII about children while the COPPA forbids that very behaviour.

Once again, we see the victim (the parent) doesn't have a duty of care to protect the child from making bad choices.

Do they know about web browsers?

[FictionPimp]

Do law makers know that web browsers can do anything most mobile apps can? In fact most mobile apps are just web apps in wrappers?

Age verfications

[gary s]

Are you under 21 Yes/no, Yes, Give us your parents email so we can validate. NO, welcome... How do you validate someone is your parent and not just a secondary account. Its not like kids would lie about this....

Already fixed on Debian

[Sloppy]

If you're a minor and you run a Debian-based OSs, just edit /etc/apt/sources.list and where it says "age=55" (or however many years after 1970 that it was, when you installed) change it to "age=17" in order to get the restrictions.

Agree in principal, but is it constitutional?

[sabbede]

Seems to me that regardless of whether it is a good or bad idea, it may have too great an impact on interstate commerce for a single State to impose it.