Utah Passes Law Requiring Apple to Verify User Age to Protect Children
Credit: Henry Wang / Wikimedia Commons
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This week, Utah legislators passed the App Store Accountability Act (S.B. 142), which requires Apple and Google to verify the ages of users in their app stores rather than leaving age verification up to individual apps.
Utah Governor Spencer Cox signed the bill this afternoon, according to CNBC, making the law the first of its kind in the United States, a move that could spur a significant shift in how user ages are verified online. The new law will require Apple to verify a user’s age when they create an Apple or Google account. If an account is opened by a child under 18, Apple will be required to link the minor’s account to a parent’s account, and parents will need to approve app purchases.
Todd Weiler, a Republican state senator and the bill’s sponsor, said the law is designed to protect children, as they may not understand an app’s terms of services and, therefore, can’t legally agree to them.
“For the past decade or longer, Instagram has rated itself as friendly for 12-year-olds,” Weiler said at a state senate committee hearing in January. “It’s not.”
In February, Apple announced new features to help ensure a child’s online safety. When an account is being set up, Apple will require the age range of the users, and if the child is under 18, parents will use a “Connect to Family” option to provide parental consent.
Apple has also updated its age range categories for the App Store and created a Declared Age Range API that developers can use to provide an age range to keep children safe from viewing content intended for adults. However, this is not technically an age verification system, as Apple has been reluctant to collect date of birth information, as it would require all users to furnish proof of age, even if they don’t want to use age-restricted apps, as it explains in its February white paper, Helping Protect Kids Online:
While only a fraction of apps on the App Store may require age verification, all users would have to hand over their sensitive personally identifying information to us-regardless of whether they actually want to use one of these limited set of apps. That means giving us data like a driver’s license, passport, or national identification number (such as a Social Security number), even if we don’t need it. And because many kids in the U.S. don’t have government-issued IDs, parents in the U.S. will have to provide even more sensitive documentation just to allow their child to access apps meant for children. That’s not in the interest of user safety or privacy.
Apple says requiring data like driver’s licenses, passport numbers, and Social Security Numbers for age verification would violate users’ privacy and safety.
Meta, X, and Snap applauded Utah for the bill’s passing and hoped other states would consider similar legislation. This is likely because the bill relieves developers (like Meta, X, and Snap) from being required to perform age verification measures by placing the onus on Apple and Google.
“Parents want a one-stop-shop to oversee and approve the many apps their teens want to download, and Utah has led the way in centralizing it within a device’s app store,” the companies said in a joint statement. “This approach spares users from repeatedly submitting personal information to countless individual apps and online services.”
While Utah’s new law is set to go into effect on May 7, it may be delayed due to possible legal challenges. The state passed a similar age-verification law for pornography websites in 2023, leading to arguments in front of the Supreme Court in January as to whether the law violates free speech.
