• by Wendy Davis , Yesterday

A Florida law restricting teens' use of social media violates the First Amendment, tech industry organizations are telling a federal appellate court.

The law, HB 3, prohibits platforms with “addictive features” from allowing anyone under 14 to create or maintain accounts, and requires those platforms to obtain parental consent before allowing 14- or 15-year-olds to create or maintain accounts.

"While states may certainly take steps to protect minors who use such services, restricting the ability of minors (and adults) to access them is not a narrowly tailored means of advancing a legitimate governmental interest," NetChoice and the Computer & Communications Industry Association write in papers recently filed with the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals.

The groups are asking the appellate court to preserve a lower court injunction blocking Florida from enforcing the law.

"Just as the government may not restrict minors’ access to libraries, movies, or video games, the government may not restrict their access to websites that for many are valuable sources for knowing current events, speaking, listening, and 'otherwise exploring the vast realms of human thought and knowledge,'" the groups add, quoting from a 2017 Supreme Court decision striking down a North Carolina law that would have restricted social media use by convicted sex offenders.

On Thursday, the think tank TechFreedom backed the tech industry's request to maintain a block on the law, writing in a friend-of-the-court brief that it "presents a bevy of First Amendment problems."

"HB 3 is a textbook content- and speaker-based regulation of speech," the group writes. "It singles out platforms where ordinary people speak to one another, disfavoring peer-to-peer content in favor of legacy media’s curated product."

Earlier this year, U.S. District Court Judge Mark Walker in Tallahassee ruling that the law likely violates teens' free speech rights and issued an injunction prohibiting enforcement.

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier recently asked the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals to lift that block. Uthmeier makes several arguments, including that NetChoice and the Computer & Communications Industry Association lack "standing" to mount a challenge based on teens' First Amendment rights.

"Since HB3’s enactment, no children, parents, or social-media users have challenged it -- only plaintiffs have," the attorney general argues.

He also contends that the law doesn't violate minors' First Amendment rights, arguing that the statute "merely limits covered platforms from 'entering into a contract' with certain children," referring to social platforms' terms of service.

Uthmeier adds that the law doesn't ban minors from social media because they can still "create accounts on platforms that forgo addictive features," and their parents can still allow access.

NetChoice and the Computer & Communications Industry Association -- which counts large tech companies like Meta and Google among their members -- counter that the companies they represent can challenge laws that violate their users' First Amendment rights.

The tech groups also urge the court to reject the argument that HB3 only restricts platforms from entering into contracts with minors.

"A law that prohibits publishing books, for example, does not become more tolerable if it accomplishes that end by banning entering a contract to [purchase or use ink]," the groups write. "So too with a law that precludes people from reading the Miami Herald by banning users from creating accounts on miamiherald.com."