Texas' Potential Social Media Ban Strictest In The History Of The World

The latest bill in Texas to restrict social media for young people is the strictest one in the history of the world thus far.  This bill as currently written, which passed the House and is now heading to the Senate, would absolutely ban anyone under 18 from using social media platforms, period.  And anyone signing up for a new social media account would face mandatory age verification, with the exact details on how that would work still not quite cut and dried yet, but most likely would involve uploading or otherwise entering government-issued IDs, perhaps via third party services.  What that means for existing accounts remains to be determined, but parents would have the right to force social media companies to summarily and permanently delete their under-18 kids' accounts upon request.

Our vehement opposition to this abomination of a bill is twofold:  1) this bill blatantly violates the First Amendment rights of people under 18, and 2) it also creates a potentially massive privacy and cybersecurity risk for ALL age due to the mandatory age verification, assuming government-issued IDs or other sensitive personal information is required.  And NO amount of lipstick can save this pig, ever.

The ONE good thing about this bill is that it will require all ID and personal data used for age verification purposes to be used only for that specific purpose and deleted immediately afterwards, unlike some other bills out there.  Thank God (or Nature) for small mercies, right?  But honestly, can we really trust Big Tech with something like that?  I think we all know the answer to that question.

And don't even for a minute think that it will stop there.  We have all seen some flavor of this movie before, and it doesn't end well.  It certainly will NOT stop at 18, mark my words.  If it passes this year, and other states and the feds subsequently join them, then it is almost certain that it will be raised to 21 nationwide by 2030, if not sooner.  Just look at alcohol and tobacco, for example, which the bill's proponents are already comparing social media to.  Whether they make a beeline for 21 as soon as next year, or perhaps take the scenic route via 19 first (to "get it out of the high schools"), still remains to be determined, but they WILL get there one way another unless they are stopped NOW.  (Other countries will at least probably stop at 18, but almost certainly NOT the USA if the zealots succeed.)  

And don't think it will stop at "merely" verifying age either.  This can VERY easily lead to an Orwellian nightmare where all privacy and any semblance of anonymity is a thing of the past, and political dissidents are targeted by the state for voicing their opinions on any controversial issues.  And it goes further downhill from there as well.  

Don't say you haven't been warned!  While this particular bill is a primarily Republican effort, it has bipartisan support, just like all other tyranny against young people.

If they really wanted to keep young people safe online (and adults too!), they would do the following:

• Pass comprehensive data privacy legislation for ALL ages which, at a minimum, would ban any and all "surveillance advertising" and "dark patterns".  This is best done at the federal level in terms of effectiveness, but states can serve as important trailblazers nonetheless.
• Regulate the algorithms better, audit them, and ban "addictive design features" for ALL ages.
• Perhaps even tax the data mining of users by social media companies.
• Have a voluntary smartphone buyback program like they do for guns.
• Since the latest trend towards "bell to bell" phone-free schools is basically a foregone conclusion at this point, they should apply it to everyone (teachers, staff, administrators, and visitors), not just students.
• If after doing all of that we absolutely MUST set an "age of digital majority", then it should be no higher than 16 (ideally no higher than 15, but certainly NO higher than 16, EVER!), and it should be a "soft" age limit with plenty of generous exceptions, and NO mandatory age verification involving any sensitive personal information whatsoever, period.
• And if after all of that, they still insist on mandatory age verification, then they need to have a billion-dollar guarantee that such information will never fall into the wrong hands, and delay implementation of that requirement until that can be guaranteed.  That is, if a person's sensitive information is retained, compromised, or misused in any way, shape or form, that person should be entitled to at least one billion dollars in damages.  But Big Tech would NEVER agree to that, of course.  And that is by design.

But this sort of ageist and Orwellian bill, or even the milder versions which are either passed or pending in other states, need to be rejected completely, and yesterday, full stop.

(Mic drop)

P.S.  If what the social mediaphobes say is true in that the Big Tech platforms "already know more about their users than the users know about themselves", then mandatory age verification is completely unnecessary for enforcing any sort of hypothetical age limit or age-specific restrictions.  Simply holding them to an "actual knowledge" or "know or ought to know" standard, and auditing their existing treasure trove of user data (including their own age estimates) to keep them honest, is all that would be needed.  The zealots really can't have it both ways!

Australia Has Fallen

Or, "Et Tu, Australia?"

Australia recently passed a sweeping new law setting a binding legal age limit of 16 for at least most social media.  It will take full effect in one year from its passage.  And aside from their notably illiberal and draconian measures during the Covid pandemic (and the fact that they were of course descended from a penal colony), this kind of thing is quite out of character to say the least for a country that has long prided itself on being relatively free-spirited and is quite famous for the saying and attitude of "no worries, mate". 

Mike Males wrote an excellent Substack article from a youth rights perspective, discussing just how wrong and harmful it is for the state to do that to young people.  And we at Twenty-One Debunked agree with him.  But even if you the reader don't agree with him, and are smug about this law perhaps appeasing the illiberal and ageist social-mediaphobes in charge, consider this: it will NOT stop there.  Mark my words, the moment they see that their voodoo didn't really work, they will triple down and expand the restrictions, tighten the age verification requirements, and/or keep increasing the age limit higher and higher.  And this will also backfire on adults as well, endangering everyone's civil rights way beyond anonymity, given the privacy and cybersecurity pitfalls inherent to ALL forms of online age verification that would be even modestly effective. 

What should be done instead is what we have long advocated, as has the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF):  a "Privacy First" approach, that is, comprehensive data privacy legislation for ALL ages, which, at a minimum, bans surveillance advertising as well as "dark patterns" and other similarly deceptive and ethically questionable practices.  That will throw the proverbial One Ring into the fire for good.  But of course, Big Tech would NOT like that.

Also, simply adding more "friction" would also make such platforms safer and less addictive overall.

So what are we waiting for?

P.S. Australia has never had any equivalent to America's Section 230, so the fact that they saw the need to "get tough" on social media companies implies that they had just as much of a problem as the USA.  Thus, outright repeal of Section 230 (as opposed to much more nuanced and narrow reforms in regards to personalization of feeds and algorithms) as some ignorant social-mediaphobes have suggested would solve absolutely nothing, and would do far more harm than good. Don't do it!  You have been warned.

UPDATE:  Pari Esfandiari also wrote a great essay about how such a ban will do more harm than good.

Excellent New Insights From Renowned Sociologist and Youth Rights Activist Mike Males

The renowned sociologist and youth rights activist Mike Males has some excellent new Substack articles debunking the latest moral panic about young people, smartphones and social media.  As we stand at a crossroads in terms of how public policy is evolving (or devolving), his words should be food for thought for any direct or indirect policymaker as well as anyone going to the polls this November. 

And here is what I added in the comments:

Honestly, I would be fine with making schools phone-free IF AND ONLY IF they alao applied the same rules to teachers, staff, and administrators. Fair is fair. After all, they wouldn't want to be flaming hypocrites about it, right? (But we all know these zealots would probably rather drink Drano than apply their double standards to themselves, of course.)

Excellent work, Mike. I would also add about the ageist abomination that is 21 drinking age, the greatest alcohol policy failure since Prohibition, that Miron and Tetelbaum (2009) also further debunked any claim of a lifesaving effect. The supposed lifesaving effect was all a mirage driven by a handful of early-adopoting states, while for the federal coerced states it was inconsequential at best or even perverse. And notably, counterintuitive as it may be, in that study not even the graduated 18/21 age limits for beer/wine vs hard liquor in some states were vindicated either (those states were disproportionately likely to be coerced late-adopters) as any better than a straight age limit of 18. So any age limit higher than 18 was a net loser in the long run, even for the early adopters whose supposed lifesaving effects evaporated after the first year or two. Oops!

The View From 2030 (At The Latest)

At the rate things are going these days, the following is a very likely conversation that will happen many times over in 2030, at the latest.  At least in the USA:

18 Year Old: "I'm an adult now.  Why am I still not allowed to go on social media or have a smartphone?"

Parent:  "Because the law now forbids both until you are 21, and the law is the law."

18 Year Old:  "But Canadian, Australian, British, and European people my age are allowed to.  As are people my age in almost every other country as well."

Parent:  "Well, we're not Canada, Australia, Europe, or any other country for that matter.  Different cultures and such.  America has too many problems as it is."

18 Year Old:  "But your generation was allowed to at a much earlier age than me!"

Parent:  "That was then.  Life was cheap back then.  We know better now.  And your grandparents were allowed to drink and smoke too at your age, which we obviously no longer allow either, so your point is?"

18 Year Old:  "And they were allowed to play outside with their friends unsupervised even when they were in single digits too, or so I have heard.  Grandma and Grandpa actually got to enjoy the real world before they forgot how to, while you got to enjoy the virtual world at least.  My generation had neither."

Parent:  "Well, the real world was much safer back then compared to now, and as for me, we didn't know just how dangerous the virtual world really was."

18 Year Old:  "Statistics say otherwise".

Parent:  "You need to watch more news and true crime documentaries before you can argue statistics.  It's really a jungle out there now. In any case, I see your statistics, and I raise you a "Because I said so!""

18 Year Old: "Statistics beat logical fallacies and anecdotes every time.  Regardless, it's not fair in what is supposed to be a free country."

Parent:  "Life isn't fair.  Deal with it!"

18 Year Old:  "But I'm literally old enough to get married, and yet I can't even post my own wedding on Facebook?  That doesn't make any sense at all."

Parent:  "If you're so mature and such an adult, then why don't you get married right now?" (Tries to trick the young person into saying they are "too young".)

18 Year Old:  "Because as an adult, I know that just because you CAN do something, it doesn't mean that you SHOULD.  Just like you raised me".

Parent:  (speechless)

18 Year Old:  (Mic drop)

How To Solve The Big Tech Problem Without Violating Anyone's Rights

"Big Tech is the new Big Tobacco" is often bandied about these days.  And while that has a kernel of truth to it (a kernel the size of a cornfield, in fact), it is also used by authoritarian zealots with a very illiberal (and ageist) agenda.  Mandatory age verification, censorship, repealing Section 230, and other related illiberal restrictions would open up the door to many unintended consequences to privacy, cybersecurity, and civil rights and liberties in general.  Even those adults who don't support youth rights will eventually experience these consequences sooner or later.  Kafka, meet trap.  Pandora, meet box.  Albatross, meet neck.

And none of these things will actually solve the collective action problem of Big Tech and the "Social Dilemma".  But here are some things that will, in descending order of priority and effectiveness:

1. First and foremost, take a "Privacy First" approach as recommended by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF).  Pass comprehensive data privacy legislation for all ages that, at a minimum, would ban surveillance advertising.
2. Audit the algorithms and internal research of the Big Tech giants, and make the results publicly available for all to see.  Sunlight is truly the best disinfectant. 
3. Require the strictest and safest privacy settings to be the default settings for all users of all ages, which can then be adjusted more liberally by the users themselves.  For example, "friends only" sharing and "no DMs enabled from people whom one does not follow" by default.  And allow the option to turn off all DMs completely as well.
4. Require or incentivize the use of various "architectural" safety features on all social media, such as various nudges, #OneClickSafer ("stop at two hops") to reduce the pitfalls of frictionless sharing, and increase the use of CAPTCHAs to root out the pervasive toxic bots.
5. If after doing that, We the People feel that we must still get stricter in terms of age, then don't make things any stricter than current California standards (i.e. CCPA and CAADCA).

The first two items on the list in particular would of course be vehemently opposed by Big Tech.  That's because their whole business model depends on creepy surveillance advertising and creepy algorithms, and thus incentivizing addiction for profit.  They would thus have to switch to the (gasp!) DuckDuckGo model if these items were done.  (Plays world's smallest violin)

For another, related collective action problem, what about the emerging idea of phone-free schools?  Fine, but to be fair, how about phone-free workplaces for all ages as well?  In both cases, it should ONLY apply while "on the clock", which for school would be best defined as being from the opening bell to the final bell of the day, as well as during any after-school detention time.  And of course, in both cases, there would have to be medical exemptions for students and employees who need such devices for real-time medical monitoring (glucose for diabetes, for example).  Surely productivity would increase so much as a result that we could easily shorten the standard workweek to 30-32 hours per week (8 hours for 4 days, or 6 hours for 5 days) with no loss in profits? 

We must remember that, at the end of the day, Big Tech is NOT our friend.  But neither are the illiberal control freak zealots.  These measures will actually make both sides quite angry indeed.  But truly that's a feature, not a bug.

Big Tech can go EFF off!