Texas Will Require Age Verification and Consent To Use App Stores

As social media, privacy, online porn, and other tech issues continue to grow in importance to regulators, the states are finding new ways to regulate the online experience in an effort to protect kids.  Texas has enacted (and several other states are considering) a parental consent law that will apply to the Apple and Google app stores.  When the law takes effect on 1/1/2026, the app stores will have to verify user age before allowing app downloads, and obtain parental consent before allowing download of social media apps by children under 18.  Age verification/consent will also be required for in-app purchases.  

WHY IT MATTERS

The tech industry has been scrimmaging internally over whose role it is to police children's access to social media and other online material.  Meta and other social media companies have argued that it's not their job, saying that only the app stores can do an effective job of preventing unauthorized access by minors.  The app stores have argued that having to confirm children's ages means that they must intrude on the privacy of all users of all apps, because they will have to collect and process age verification data for all app downloads, even when the app is uncontroversial.  Although Americans broadly agree that children should be restricted from certain material online, the particulars are still in legal limbo.  Laws like the new Texas act are likely to face First Amendment challenges, because they will affect adult users of the app store as well as minors.  App store operators are likely to claim that the government could pass laws protecting children that are narrower in their application.  

Texas is the second-largest state in the US, and its actions are bound to have an influence on other states.  The New York Times has reported that 20 states are considering similar age verification measures.  (Utah was the first to pass one.)  The US has no comprehensive national law covering kids and social media access, which means that the states (and the platform and app store owners) are likely to keep hashing it out as they try new approaches.  Conflicting standards and disputes are therefore likely to continue.