• by Wendy Davis , Yesterday

A House Energy and Commerce subcommittee on Thursday advanced a package of 18 bills aimed at protecting minors online, including a watered-down version of the controversial Kids Online Safety Act.

The current House version of the Kids Online Safety Act (HR 6484) would require platforms to establish "reasonable" policies addressing specific harms to minors -- including threats of violence, sex abuse, drug use and financial loss caused by fraud.

Another provision would make it illegal for platforms to facilitate ads for drugs, tobacco, gambling or alcohol to users known to be minors.

The bill additionally would require platforms to provide known minors with tools that limit others' ability to communicate with them, and provide parents of known minors with tools to change their privacy settings.

If passed, the measure would override state laws.

Prior House versions of the bill -- as well as a version that the Senate passed last year -- would have imposed more restrictions on platforms. Those iterations would have required platforms to use “reasonable care" to implement design features in a way that would "prevent and mitigate" a host of harms to minors -- including anxiety, depression, eating disorders, substance use disorders, suicidal behaviors, "addition-like" behavior, violence, sex abuse and drug use. The specific design features at issue included push alerts, appearance-altering filters and videos that play automatically.

The Senate bill and prior House bill drew opposition from civil liberties groups, who argued it would impose unconstitutional restrictions on companies' ability to wield editorial control over material on their platforms.

Some left-leaning opponents warned that the measure would allow government officials to target platforms that allow teens to access LGBTQ content, on the theory that such material is harmful.

At the same time, some conservatives also expressed fears that the bill will encourage platforms to aggressively filter any controversial speech, including posts that carry right-wing messages.

Rep. Gus Bilirakis (R-Florida), who introduced the current bill, said Thursday he revised the measure in hopes that it would be "durable."

He also suggested in his opening statement that some revisions were aimed at staving off a constitutional challenge.

“Our bills are mindful of the Constitution’s protections for free speech," he said. "We’ve seen it in the states -- laws with good intentions have been struck down for violating the First Amendment. We are learning from those experiences because a law that gets struck down in court does not protect a single child."

Democrats on the subcommittee opposed the bill, with ranking member Rep. Frank Pallone, Jr. (New Jersey) expressing concerns over the provision overriding state laws.