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New York Governor Kathy Hochul has signed two bills designed to regulate social media use among teens. This includes banning social media companies from serving up "addictive feeds" to users under the age of 18.
The Stop Addictive Feeds Exploitation (SAFE) For Kids Act bars social media companies from using recommendation algorithms to target underage users unless parental consent is received.
The law might be the first time a US state has explicitly tried to regulate recommendation algorithms, which can push content into your social media feed based on your likes, how long you view preview content, or your demographics and internet browsing activities.
Although recommendation algorithms aim to show you content you’ll be interested in, Hochul and supporters of the SAFE For Kids Act allege that these same technologies have caused “a dramatic negative effect” on teens, citing phone addiction and declining mental health levels.
“Today, we save our children,” Hochul said in a Thursday event. The “addictive forces” of social media have been turning “happy-go-lucky” kids into depressed teenagers — some of whom have contemplated suicide, she says.
In response, the SAFE For Kids Act will require social media companies operating in New York to ditch the recommendation algorithms for “non-addictive feeds,” such as displaying content to teen users chronologically. "New York is sending a clear message to Big Tech: your profits are not more important than our kids’ privacy and wellbeing," added State Senator Andrew Gounardes, who sponsored the bill.
The law also prohibits social media platforms from "sending notifications regarding addictive feeds to minors from 12:00 a.m. to 6:00 a.m. without parental consent,” Hochul’s office says.
To enforce the SAFE For Kids Act, the state’s attorney general has been empowered to seek civil penalties up to $5,000 per violation and to receive complaints from the public about alleged infractions. The law will take effect 180 days after the state's attorney general formalizes the rules.
On the same day, Hochul also signed the New York Child Data Protection Act, which bars both social media companies and online websites from “collecting, using, sharing or selling personal data of anyone under the age of 18." The data can only be collected unless parental consent is received or the information is necessary to operate the website.
At the federal level, the existing Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) requires parental consent for kids under 13, which is why most social networks don't allow people to sign up if they're under the age of 13. There's an effort at the FTC right now to update COPPA to address the increased use of mobile devices and social networking.
Although the two laws threaten to upend how social media companies treat teen users, it’s possible the tech industry will challenge the regulations in court. The American Civil Liberties Union argues that while the SAFE For Kids Acts is “well-intended,” the law nevertheless violates free speech rights protected under the First Amendment.
“Limiting content delivery—even without targeting a particular subject—in this manner, to only government-approved quantities and sequences, is still unconstitutional,” the group wrote earlier this month.
Tech lobbying group Chamber of Progress agreed, saying in a statement: "The bill dictates what speech platforms can and cannot show users, so it’s going to face a constitutional minefield."