Senate passes landmark legislation for children’s online safety — but it faces hurdles in House

The Senate on Tuesday overwhelmingly passed landmark online child safety reforms — though the legislation, which has drawn mixed reactions from the tech industry, faces an uncertain fate in the House.

The two bills — the Children and Teens’ Online Privacy Protection Act and the Kids Online Safety Act, nicknamed COPPA 2.0 and KOSA — were approved in a rare bipartisan 91-3 vote.

They now need to pass in the Republican-controlled House, currently on recess until September, to become law.

COPPA 2.0 would ban targeted advertising to minors and data collection without their consent, and give parents and kids the option to delete their information from social media platforms.

“Kids are not your product, kids are not your profit source, and we are going to protect them in the virtual space,” Sen. Marsha Blackburn, a Republican cosponsor of KOSA, said in a press conference after Tuesday’s vote.

Maurine Molak, co-founder of ParentsSOS, a group of parents who said their children’s deaths were linked to social media, called the vote a “historic and emotional milestone for myself and for all parents who have fought tirelessly to protect our children.”

Top U.S. social media platforms made an estimated $11 billion in advertising revenue from users younger than 18 in 2022, according to a Harvard study published last year.

KOSA would make explicit a “duty of care” that social media companies have when it comes to minors using their products, focusing on design of the platforms and regulation of the companies.

Executives at social media sites Snap and X said at a congressional hearing in January that they supported KOSA, while Facebook and Instagram owner Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg and TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew said they disagreed with parts of it.

The legislation faces an uncertain future in the House, where some members have claimed the bill is an infringement on free speech.

“The second half can be the toughest in some ways, but also the easiest psychologically because you see the end in sight,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, who co-wrote the legislation.

Blumenthal – who co-wrote KOSA with Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) – said the bill is for parents and children “to say to big tech, we no longer trust you to make decisions for us.”

Parents of children who died by suicide after being bullied online have been pushing for the Senate to vote on the protective legislation. 

Some parents watched the vote on Tuesday from the gallery above.

Julianna Arnold of New York was in the audience. She lost her 17-year-old daughter Lucienne Konar, known as Coco, to fentanyl poisoning after an Instagram dealer sold her counterfeit Percocet laced with the drug.

“It makes you feel like you have a purpose after all of this horror,” Arnold told The New York Times. “It feels good to be doing something good and taking something so dark and bringing light to it.”

Social media dangers are rampant — 80% of parents say their kids have experienced some form of online harm, ranging from illicit content to harassment, according to online safety expert Verifymy.

“The level of harmful and illegal content online today is unacceptable,” Verifymy COO Andy Lulham said in a statement. “Parents are rightly worried and are doing everything they can to educate and protect their kids as they interact online.”

Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) took some heat earlier this month for slowing down the bill’s progress when he promised – and failed – to schedule a floor vote by June 20, despite the legislation’s widespread support.

Schumer’s slowdown is not the only obstacle in the bill’s path. 

KOSA strives to strike a balance between social media restrictions and the protection of free speech.

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) has reportedly sought assurances that KOSA would not weaken Section 230, a controversial statute he co-authored that protects online services from being liable for third-party content generated by its users, sources said. 

Tech industry groups and the American Civil Liberties Union have criticized the bill, saying that differing interpretations of harmful content could result in minors losing access to content related to vaccines, abortion or LGBTQ issues.

Senators amended the language of the bill in response to such concerns earlier this year, in part by limiting the enforcement responsibility of states’ attorneys general.

However even after the changes, critics remained.

“They made improvements, but not enough,” Wyden told reporters on Monday night. “I still think it is going to harm a lot of LGBTQ kids because of the way it’s going to make it difficult for them to get information.”

He was one of the three votes against the bill on Tuesday.

Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, a think tank that receives funding from Meta, Google and other major technology companies, called the bills flawed. KOSA would open the door to censorship and COPPA 2.0 would cut off revenue for services aimed at teens, the group said.

“This country needs children’s online safety and privacy legislation that strikes the right balance between protecting consumers without infringing on their free speech rights or stifling innovation,” ITIF Senior Policy Manager Ash Johnson said.