• by Wendy Davis  @wendyndavis, April 28, 2025

The tech industry is pressing a federal judge to block a Florida law that prohibits social platforms with “addictive” qualities from allowing anyone under 14 to create or maintain accounts, and also requires those platforms to obtain parental consent before allowing 14- or 15-year-olds to create or maintain accounts.

“Burdening protected speech that citizens find especially compelling is especially inconsistent with the First Amendment,” the tech organizations NetChoice and the Computer & Communications Industry Association argue in papers filed Monday with U.S. District Court Judge Mark Walker in Tallahassee.

The groups add that Florida's new lawsuit against Snap for allegedly defying the law makes the request for an injunction “all the more urgent.”

The law (HB3), which was passed last year and took effect last month, covers platforms with an allegedly addictive quality -- such as displaying “like” counts, or automatically playing videos. The statute only applies to a platform if at least 10% of users under 16 spend at least two hours per day on average at that platform.

The battle over the law began last October, when NetChoice and the Computer & Communications Industry Association challenged the restrictions on First Amendment grounds.

Walker dismissed the organizations' original complaint last month, ruling that they lacked “standing” to proceed because they hadn't shown how any members would be affected.

NetChoice and the Computer & Communications Industry Association then filed an amended complaint, specifically alleging that NetChoice member Snap was likely covered by the law. That complaint includes allegations that Snapchat, operated by Snap, allows teens under 16 to create accounts without parental permission, deploys recommendation algorithms and allows push notifications.

Last week, Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier sued Snap in state court based on the allegations in the amended complaint.

At around the same, Uthmeier's office asked Walker to reject the tech industry's request for an injunction. Uthmeier raised several arguments, including that blocking the law would impede the case against Snapchat.

“Florida has filed a state enforcement action against Snap under HB3 ... and 'the relief requested' by plaintiffs would interfere with that prosecution,” Uthmeier argued, adding that the Supreme Court ruled in 1971 that federal courts shouldn't hamper ongoing state proceedings.

NetChoice and the Computer & Communications Industry Association urge Walker to reject that argument, noting that they sought an injunction six months before Florida officials sued Snap.

“The state’s eleventh-hour lawsuit against Snap is not an 'ongoing' or 'pending' state court proceeding,” they write.

The groups add that the state court lawsuit “appears to have been initiated in a bad faith effort to frustrate plaintiffs’ ability to litigate their federal claims in federal court.”

Uthmeier additionally argued that HB3 only restrict teens' ability to create accounts, but doesn't in itself prevent teens from accessing social media without an account.

“If users can access a feed without an account, HB3 would not impede a platform from disseminating the feed to children and adults regardless of whether the platform uses addictive features,” he argues.

But NetChoice and the Computer & Communications Industry Association counter that accessing a platform anonymously doesn't substitute for having an account with the platform.

“People do not just use 'social media' to anonymously browse content posted by others,” the groups write. “They use those websites to engage in the sort of social interaction with other users that is only possible with an account, such as publishing their thoughts on their Facebook profiles, sharing photos with friends on Instagram, or sending videos to their friends on Snapchat.”

The tech groups note that the Supreme Court in 2011 struck down a California law that would have prohibited companies from selling violent video games to minors, without parental consent.

The court ruled 7-2 in that case that the ban violated the First Amendment, with conservative Justice Antonin Scalia writing for the majority that states don't have a “free-floating power to restrict the ideas to which children may be exposed.”

Walker hasn't yet indicated when he will issue a ruling.