California's State Senate passes an online safety bill requiring services to increase protections for users under 18; Governor Newsom must approve the bill
see below — partied?) extensively with good ole Harvey Weinstein: https://twitter.com/... @accountabletech : BREAKING: The California State Senate has passed the #CAKidsCode. This is a huge step forward—a first-of-its-kind measure in the U.S. to protect the safety of children and teens online. https://twitter.com/... Eric Goldman / @ericgoldman : The CA legislature passed 2 bills that will tear down the Internet Details on AB 2273 https://blog.ericgoldman.org/ ... Details on AB 587 https://blog.ericgoldman.org/ ... I hope @GavinNewsom vetoes both due to their obvious unconstitutionality 🙏 (More on 587's problems: https://papers.ssrn.com/...) https://twitter.com/... Gustavo Turner / @gustavoturnerx : Now she wants every person who visits every website to prove that they are not a child, because in 2012 — around the time the Queen made her a Baroness — she made a documentary and realized there's porn on the internet. No, really: https://www.theguardian.com/ ... Mike Masnick / @mmasnick : Fun photo of the Baroness who helped draft California's new “protect the children” legislation, paling around with Harvey Weinstein. https://twitter.com/... Gustavo Turner / @gustavoturnerx : The California legislature has just passed today a controversial bill mandating sweeping-yet-vague age verification to any website “likely to be accessed by children.” Drafted by a British noblewoman who also directed the 2004 romantic comedy “Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason”: https://twitter.com/... Tony Fadell / @tfadell : Go CA! Last week ICE cars & now - Sweeping Children's Online Safety Bill Is Passed in California “Holds online services to auto industry-like safety standards... requiring apps & sites to install the digital equivalent of seatbelts & airbags for kids.” https://www.nytimes.com/... @dataprogress : California just passed the Age-Appropriate Design Code to protect the safety of children online. Our polling finds that 90% of CA voters support the law, which will hold Big Tech accountable for keeping young users safe while using their products. https://www.dataforprogress.org/ ... https://twitter.com/... Jesse Lehrich / @jesselehrich : grateful for the leadership of Asms. @BuffyWicks @Cunning_Jordan + the tireless advocacy of our partners at @5RightsFound @ptogetheraction @fairplayforkids @CommonSense @logoffmovement @technicallypoli & so many others who made this possible https://twitter.com/... Mike Masnick / @mmasnick : Apparently not a SINGLE CALIFORNIA SENATOR voted against the dangerous #CAKidsCode. This is bad and will do massive damage. Shameful. Newsom can veto, but looks like CA Leg can overturn the veto and waste a ton of taxpayer money fighting this unconstitutional mess https://twitter.com/... Signy Arnason / @signyarnason : Treating the internet as a product, with safety measures in place, just makes sense. Great Kids' Code safety bill passed in California that we hope to see more of, globally. https://www.nytimes.com/... @commonsense : Today's vote on #CAKidsCode sends an important signal about the need to make kids online health and safety a greater priority for lawmakers and tech companies. Governor @GavinNewsom should sign this bill. https://www.nytimes.com/... Randi Weingarten / @rweingarten : Great news out of California, where lawmakers are leading the nation in requiring big tech to build protections for kids. We are proud to stand with students, parents, @cftunion, and communities in supporting the legislation. https://twitter.com/... @accountabletech : California can lead the nation by passing the #CAKidsCode to help protect California's children from addictive and toxic online environments. Read the op-ed from Nancy Kim, a law professor at @ChicagoKentLaw. https://www.latimes.com/... @omidyarnetwork : Phenomenal news out of CA tonight. The state is leading the country protecting kids' safety online. https://twitter.com/... L. Barrington-Leach / @leandabl : Today we take a MASSIVE step forward towards the recognition and enforcement of children's established rights in the digital environment! 🎉https://www.nytimes.com/ ... Natasha Singer / @natashanyt : This just in: California passes landmark children's online safety bill by a vote of 33 to 0. It's the first U.S. state statute that would require social media, games and other platforms for general audiences to install guardrails for users under 18. https://www.nytimes.com/... Carrie Goldberg / @cagoldberglaw : All the section 230 protectionists have been asleep at the wheel while over last couple years, the world has accepted and normalized that these platforms are just products. And must be held to common standards of care. Natasha Singer / @natashanyt : good point @cagoldberglaw ... Tech industry lobbying helped kill a California bill that would have allowed parents to sue social media companies for harms to children. The children's online safety bill may not have passed last night if it had included private right of action. https://twitter.com/... Carrie Goldberg / @cagoldberglaw : Huge news: Platforms must factor in harms to children in their product design. Or face fines and injunctions by CA AG. Now let's do one in NY with private right of action so kids (and not govt) can sue for harmful design. Wdyt @Sen_Gounardes https://www.nytimes.com/...
Context & Ripple Effects
California lawmakers had already outlined a child-data proposal modeled on the UK's age-appropriate design code, giving the Senate vote a defined policy lineage rather than making it a stand-alone intervention. The bill's next step is Governor Newsom's decision.
The subsequent enactment limiting data collection from minors and later measures on addictive feeds and overnight notifications show California building a broader, continuing framework for youth protections online.
First-order effects
- Governor Newsom becomes the immediate decision-maker on whether the Senate-approved requirements become obligations for online services serving Californians under 18.
- Services covered by the bill face a prospective shift toward stronger protections for minors, with the exact operational burden dependent on approval and implementation.
Second-order effects
- A signed law would make California's treatment of minors' data and safety a compliance issue for platforms, reinforcing the earlier policy focus on age-appropriate design.
- Later California rules targeting feed design and notifications extend the pressure from data practices into product-interface choices for social-media services.
Third-order effects
- California's sequence of youth-safety laws points toward platform governance that treats minors' protections as a combination of data limits, interface constraints, and platform responsibility rather than a single privacy rule.
The trend: California is moving youth online-safety policy from child-data safeguards toward broader regulation of how platforms design and operate services for minors.