Trade group NetChoice, whose members include Meta and Twitter, sues Arkansas over a law requiring parental permission for minors to open social media accounts
Arkansas is the opening move in a broader state wave: nine states were advancing online child safety bills by early 2024, with NetChoice leading the lobbying against them. The same playbook then went to Utah over its near-identical parental consent laws, and an Arkansas district judge later temporarily blocked the law before its September effective date.
First-order effects
Meta and Twitter are spared immediate compliance costs in Arkansas: while the lawsuit runs, the parental-permission requirement cannot be enforced against their minor users in the state.
Arkansas attorneys general and regulators must defend the law in court rather than implement it, shifting the state's child-safety policy from statute to litigation.
Second-order effects
Utah and the other states drafting similar consent laws now face a proven legal template aimed at them, raising the expected cost of passing minors' social media legislation at all.
NetChoice's centralized litigation model means member platforms like Meta and Twitter fight these battles through one trade group instead of filing separate suits, standardizing the First Amendment argument across states.
Third-order effects
If courts keep blocking or delaying these laws, age-gating rules for minors will be set by judicial rulings rather than legislatures, producing a patchwork where a teen's access to social media depends on which state's law survived challenge.
The pattern pushes state policymakers toward laws harder to litigate away — design mandates and liability provisions rather than consent requirements — as the consent-law approach accumulates court losses.
The trend: State-level child safety regulation is colliding with coordinated trade-group litigation, making courts rather than legislatures the deciding venue for how minors access social media.
@NetChoice just filed a lawsuit challenging Arkansas's internet age-gating law, SB 396, which: - limits minors from accessing social media, and - requires all Arkansans to provide sensitive personal information - usually gov't-issued ID - in order to use the internet freely
@paul_taske
Paul Taske on x
The First Amendment. 1A forbids government discrimination against content, viewpoint, or speakers. Yet, SB 396 makes distinctions based on each by targeting certain social speech & speakers for disfavored treatment. SB 396's distinctions are textbook 1A violations. 2/
@netchoice
@netchoice on x
Today, NetChoice filed a lawsuit against Arkansas to protect constitutional freedoms in the Digital Age. SB 396 makes Arkansans' First Amendment rights contingent on whether they hand over their most sensitive, personal data. Read NetChoice v. Griffin: https://netchoice.org/... […
@paul_taske
Paul Taske on x
Vagueness. Due Process requires that laws give fair notice of what is forbidden and who is covered by the law. SB 396 covers social media companies where profiles are created “for the primary purpose of interacting socially.” Yet, it leaves “primary purpose” undefined. 3/
@chrismarchese9
Chris Marchese on x
Excellent background on our lawsuit against Arkansas over its unconstitutional age-verification law. https://apnews.com/...
@paul_taske
Paul Taske on x
Does @Spotify count? @Pinterest? @Goodreads? Laws w/o appropriate definitions are unconstitutionally vague. Preemption. SB 396 proponents argue that the law is necessary to protect minors online. But Congress has already acted in this space through COPPA. 4/
@paul_taske
Paul Taske on x
We flesh out these arguments in more detail in our complaint. Of course, SB 396 presents other issues as well. The First Amendment protects the right to speak anonymously. SB 396 makes that impossible in Arkansas because it requires age verification. 7/ https://netchoice.org/...
@voiceofd
Dylan McLemore on x
There it is. Meta, TikTok & Twitter sue Arkansas on First Amendment grounds over its law requiring age verification to create social media accounts. I break down potential issues with the law up-thread. Story by @ademillo https://apnews.com/...
@tommarslaw
Tom Mars on x
Another predictable lawsuit against the State of Arkansas alleging constitutional violations: “The lawsuit argues that the new requirement violates the constitutional rights of [social media] users and singles out types of speech that would be restricted.” https://twitter.com/...