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Last week the House passed H.5349, which bans social media for children under 14 and requires age verification for all users. I voted no, but the vote advanced the bill forward with a tally of 129-25.
I understand the impulse behind this bill. Parents are worried about the impact of social media and teachers are exhausted by phones in classrooms.
I fully share those concerns and support policy to solve this problem by regulating the addictive and predatory practices of social media platforms. But this bill does not regulate big tech social media companies, it regulates individual users and it requires every person in Massachusetts, including adults, to hand over a government ID or face scan to use social media. And it will not be effective in making our kids safer.
In order to restrict users under age 14, platforms must check everyone. The Electronic Frontier Foundation, the ACLU, and the Center for Democracy and Technology agree: there is no system that identifies only minors.
The companies building these systems have been breached repeatedly. AU10TIX, which verifies users for TikTok and LinkedIn, had credentials exposed for 18 months. IDMerit left one billion records online with no password, including 203 million U.S. records with social security numbers.
Persona, which along with Palentir, the surveillance company with contracts with ICE, is backed by Peter Thiel, provides age verification services for Reddit, OpenAI, LinkedIn, and Discord (UK). Their entire government dashboard codebase was exposed and it revealed that the company performs facial recognition checks against watchlists and had built-in federal reporting.
Fifteen national organizations including the ACLU, the Trevor Project, GLAAD, Lambda Legal, the Transgender Law Center, and others, formally oppose this kind of ban because it disproportionately harms LGBTQ+ youth.
The Trevor Project’s 2024 survey found that 74% of LGBTQ+ youth go online to find connection available to them in daily life. Hopelab found 47% of trans youth feel safe expressing identity online versus 7% in person. Fewer than 40% say their home is affirming.
The bill cuts off potentially life-saving resources and online community from LGBTQ+ teens.
Winchester families should also know that nearly 7,000 Massachusetts children in DCF custody or foster care have no clear path to parental consent under this bill. Many live in group homes with no single adult in a parental role. The bill does not address who provides consent for them. These are children the state is supposed to protect, and this bill would cut them off from online communities that their peers have access to. LGBTQ+ youth are disproportionately represented in foster care, compounding the harm.
Finally, the bill will not be effective in achieving its stated goal. Florida saw a 1,150% VPN spike the day its law took effect. The Global Privacy Enforcement Network found 72% of tested websites failed to prevent circumvention. A
s a result, some users hand over private information that will be breached, while others bypass the system entirely. Eight federal courts have struck down or enjoined identical laws. Even Ways and Means Chair Michlewitz acknowledged “potential legal challenges.” Massachusetts will spend years and taxpayer money defending a law that courts have consistently rejected based on the first amendment.
Please contact the governor and your state legislators, and ask them to remove the age-minimum social media ban. A better approach is requiring platforms to disable addictive algorithms and ban targeted advertising to minors. That is what would be effective in protecting our youth.
Erika Uyterhoeven is the state representative for the 27th Middlesex District and a candidate for state Senate for the 2nd Middlesex District, which covers all of Medford and a portion of Winchester.
