Texas is set to lead the nation in restrictive legislation. Under a proposed bill, minors would be banned from social media, while platforms would also be required to introduce age verification methods. While supporters say the change would make children safer, critics argue that such legislation may do the exact opposite.
Introduced in November, House Bill 186 would prevent minors from creating accounts on social media platforms like Twitter, TikTok, Instagram, and more. Platforms would be required to use “public or private transactional data” to verify that account holders are at least 18 years old. In addition, parents could request the deletion of any of their child’s existing accounts. Companies would have to cooperate with that request within 10 days.
Under the law, social media platforms are limited to public websites or applications that allow users to communicate with each other “for the primary purpose of posting information, comments, messages, or images.” It wouldn’t apply to e-mail, news, or gambling sties.
The bill’s author, Rep. Jared Patterson, has consistently framed HB 186 as addressing a mental health crisis. In a March social media post, he wrote, “I consider this to be the most important bill I will present to my House colleagues this session. After extensive research, it’s clear: social media is the most harmful product our kids have legal access to in Texas.”
According to the Age Verification Providers Associate, 10 states have passed their own legislation restricting minors’ social media access since June 2024. Many laws center around limiting access to porn, like Texas’ pre-existing HB 1181, which requires age verification if at least a third of a website’s content is “sexual material harmful to minors.” (That law is now at the center of a Supreme Court case.) But per the Texas Tribune, Florida is the only other state with a similar outright ban on social media for minors. However, it only extends to those under 14.
HB 186 has already passed Texas’ House with bipartisan support and, so far, it seems that members of the Senate are fans as well. Per the Texas Tribune, Sen. Adam Hinojosa, co-sponsor, told fellow lawmakers at a recent State Affairs Committee hearing, “Like so many parents across our state, I’ve watched my children grow up in a world that feels less and less safe, not because of where they go physically, but because of where they go online, in spaces that my wife and I cannot possibly monitor at all times.”
“We have the ability and the power to act today,” Hinojosa also told lawmakers. “With House Bill 186, we confront the evil before us and boldly say, ‘You cannot have our children.’”
It’s true that social media harms youth (and adults, too). In 2023, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy warned that although social media’s impacts aren’t fully understood, “There are ample indicators that [it] can also have a profound risk of harm to the mental health and well-being of children and adolescents.” Following Murthy’s comments, the American Psychological Association released a health advisory on adolescent social media use. It also released a report with the American Federation for Teachers and several other organizations detailing social media’s contribution to worsening mental health.
But strict bills like HB 186 don’t necessarily address that problem. As Morgan McGuire, a 17-year-old Texas resident and TikTok creator, said, per the Texas Tribune, “The harmful content that young people are exposed to online does not disappear when they turn 18. The bill throws young adults into a digital world at a time when they are living on their own for the first time, without the support systems that they had as minors, which can have serious harm on mental health.”
Age verification bills have also faced backlash for violating First Amendment rights. In a statement, Megan Stokes, state policy director for the Computer & Communications Industry Association, said, “HB 186 conflicts with Texas contract law and undermines teens’ rights to access information, express themselves, and participate in today’s digital economy…[It] is a flawed proposal, one that censors speech rather than supporting families with tools and education.”
In a letter, trade association NetChoice’s director of policy, Patrick Hedger, noted that age verification laws in several other states are already being challenged and blocked by courts, including in Arkansas, California, Mississippi, Texas, and Utah. Hedger also said that Texas’ proposed legislation “usurps parental decision making,” writing, “Every family has different needs. Some parents may allow their child to use YouTube Kids for educational videos, and others may choose to let their teen join a moderated online community to discuss their hobbies or interests.”
“These are choices that parents and guardians should have the right to make depending on their own child’s needs — rather than the government mandating how families in Texas use the internet,” Hedger continued.
Along with First Amendment concerns, age verification bills like HB 186 are privacy nightmares. Although the legislation says that social media platforms must delete personal data gathered for age verification, it doesn’t explicitly state how soon nor does it provide social media platforms with guidance on how to prove their compliance. Per Hedger, this oversight incentivizes platforms to collect “multiple forms of personally-identifiable information.”
“Platforms may utilize and delete one piece of ‘transactional data’ for age verification, while collecting and retaining other personal data for purposes of legal defense,” Hedger wrote. “This means websites would need to collect and store sensitive information, creating massive databases that will inevitable become targets for hackers.”
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