Florida bans children under 14 from social media in restrictive new law

The US state of Florida has passed legislation that bars children under the age of 14 from having social media accounts in the latest attempt to shield minors from harmful content online.

The new law, one of the most restrictive of its kind in America, will force social media companies to delete the accounts of children under 14 when it comes into effect in January next year. Children aged 14 and 15 will need a parent’s consent to join a platform.

Tech companies that fail to enforce the age restriction could be forced to pay up to $10,000 in damages to each child and fines of up to $50,000. All data and information on children below the age limit must be deleted along with their accounts.

“Social media harms children,” Ron DeSantis, governor of Florida, said as he signed the bill, named HB3, into law on Monday. “Being buried in those devices all day is not the best way to grow up. It’s not the best way to get a good education.”

DeSantis, the former Republican presidential candidate who abandoned his challenge to Donald Trump in January, previously vetoed a more draconian version of the bill that would have banned social media accounts for all Florida children under 16.

Setting the stage for a court battle with the tech giants, who have already signalled that they will challenge the law, DeSantis said he had worked with Florida lawmakers to craft legislation “that actually sticks”. Other Florida politicians compared social media to “digital fentanyl”, accusing tech companies of fuelling a mental health crisis among American teenagers.

The new law does not name specific social media platforms but targets sites that use notification alerts and autoplay videos to encourage compulsive viewing and keep users online.

The move comes amid mounting efforts to regulate social media in the US and concern at the effect of online content on children.

In the UK, last year’s Online Safety Act puts the onus on social media companies to do more to protect minors from harmful and illegal content, but no age-restricted ban on social media has come into effect.

Other US states have proposed similar legislation but stopped short of the sweeping ban passed in Florida.

In New York legislation is being prepared to stop minors from accessing “addictive feeds” without parental consent, and the Idaho governor Brad Little called social media the “obvious reason for the decline in youth mental health” at his state of the state address in January, asking the legislature to protect minors through law.

In Utah, a law restricting minors from using social media between 10:30pm and 6:30am and banning minors from opening accounts without parental consent is facing a legal challenge.

Several proposed laws have faced court challenges from tech companies. A law in Arkansas that would have required age verification for social media users and parental consent for children was blocked by a federal judge in August.

NetChoice, a coalition of social media platforms whose members include Meta, the parent company of Facebook, along with TikTok, Google and Snapchat, sued to block the Arkansas law last year. The group has also challenged social media restrictions proposed in California and Ohio.

The Ohio law requiring children to have parental consent before using social media apps was blocked from coming into effect last month as the legal challenge from NetChoice proceeds.

The chief executives of Meta, TikTok and X/Twitter were grilled by members of Congress in January, when they affirmed their commitment to child safety online. The companies pointed to steps they had taken to restrict access to harmful content for younger children.

More than 40 states sued Meta last year, alleging that the company had misled the public about the dangers that social media posed to younger children. In response, Instagram and Facebook imposed new restrictions that automatically shield teenagers from videos and posts about self-harm and eating disorders, graphic violence and sexually explicit content.

NetChoice has indicated that it will contest the new law in Florida, declaring it “unconstitutional”.

“We’re disappointed to see Governor DeSantis sign on to this route,” Carl Szabo, vice-president of NetChoice, said. “There are better ways to keep Floridians, their families and their data safe and secure online without violating their freedoms.”

Paul Renner, Florida House Speaker, who attended the bill signing with DeSantis, said that the state was ready to take on the social media giants. “We’re going to beat them,” Renner said of NetChoice, insisting that the law does not infringe the right to free speech. “We’ve not addressed that at all. What we have addressed is the addictive features that are at the heart of why children stay on these platforms for hours and hours on end.”