Virginia social media law takes effect amid legal challenge
Daniel de la Hoz via Getty Images
By
Chris Teale
Minors in the commonwealth can now only use the platforms for one hour a day, with any more time requiring parental approval via age verification. An industry group is suing to block it.
The start of the new year meant a new Virginia law came into effect limiting children to using social media for one hour per day, except if they have parental permission, although the law is subject to a legal challenge.
Gov. Glenn Youngkin signed the rules into law last year requiring social media platforms to use age verification technology to determine if a user is a minor. Their limit of one hour’s use per day can be extended by a parent. Supporters said the regulations will place guard rails on how much Virginia’s young people use social media.
“Big tech is trying to keep kids addicted to their phones when they should be with their family and friends, working on school work, etc.,” State Sen. Schuyler VanValkenburg, the bill’s chief patron, said in a post on his Instagram account. “This is a common sense step (and first attempt) to try and create a new default. One where parents and kids have control, not Instagram or TikTok.”
This law went into effect as several states have looked to get their children’s social media use under control, considering the platforms’ negative mental health and educational effects for minors and their parents. New York is in the midst of the rulemaking process for its Stop Addictive Feeds Exploitation for Kids Act, while Utah’s efforts are well underway and a Florida law has been allowed to take effect. Relatedly, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a Texas law requiring users to verify their ages before using adult entertainment websites. Indiana is also trying again to implement its own social media regulations.
However, other states have been unsuccessful in their efforts to regulate social media and verify internet users’ ages online. An Arkansas law was struck down temporarily by a federal judge as it continued to its way through the courts, while Louisiana’s own law was found to be unconstitutional late last year. Arkansas lawmakers have introduced a new version of that state’s bill.
And this Virginia law is already the subject of a lawsuit from NetChoice, an industry trade group that has filed suit against numerous state-level laws. In the suit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, NetChoice argued that the law places unlawful barriers on how residents can access free speech online, in violation of the First Amendment. The group also argued the law usurped parental rights and posed cybersecurity issues.
“The First Amendment forbids government from imposing time-limits on access to lawful speech,” Paul Taske, co-director of the NetChoice Litigation Center, said in a November statement when the suit was filed. “Virginia’s government cannot force you to read a book in one-hour chunks, and it cannot force you to watch a movie or documentary in state-preferred increments. That does not change when the speech in question happens online.”
The complaint alleges that the new Virginia law is the “latest attempt in a long line of government efforts to restrict new forms of constitutionally protected expression based on concerns about their potential effects on minors.” But it says that the responsibility for deciding what speech is appropriate for young people resides with their parents.
NetChoice argued that the law violates free speech protections and argues that it has been written in such a way that defines social media platforms as anywhere that relies on user-generated content.
“But by that metric, the state could restrict access to the most popular segments of nearly any medium for constitutionally protected speech, be it enticing video games, page-turning novels, binge-worthy TV shows, or marathon movie nights,” the complaint says. “Burdening protected speech that citizens find especially interesting and want to spend extra time consuming is especially inconsistent with the First Amendment.”
VanValkenburg has said previously that the bill is broad enough to survive legal scrutiny.
"This is content neutral. This is platform neutral, and so I think that this law is a reasonable attempt to balance free speech with the safety and privacy of our children," he told Virginia Public Radio in a previous interview.