• by Wendy Davis , Yesterday

Digital rights watchdogs are urging a federal appellate court to preserve a block on a new Colorado law mandating cigarette-style warnings for social media.

The warning-label law "would compel a message that is neither factual nor uncontroversial," organizations including the Center for Democracy & Technology, Surveillance Technology Oversight Project and LGBT Technology Institute argue in a friend-of-the-court brief filed Friday with the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Colorado's Healthier Social Media Use by Youth Act (HB24-1136), which had been slated to take effect in January, requires social platforms to either provide minors with information about social media engagement that helps them "understand the impact of social media on the developing brain and the mental and physical health of youth users," or send pop-up warnings every 30 minutes to minors who use the platforms for more than one hour a day (or between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m.).

The tech industry group NetChoice sued over the law, arguing it violates the First Amendment by forcing platforms to spread Colorado's view that social media is harmful.

That organization, which represents large platforms including Google and Meta, argued in its court papers that there is "intense scholarly and social debate" regarding social media's actual effect on users.

U.S. District Court Judge William Martinez in Denver sided with NetChoice and issued a preliminary injunction prohibiting enforcement.

State Attorney General Philip Weiser recently petitioned the 10th Circuit to lift the injunction, arguing that the law is comparable to statutes mandating health and safety disclosures for goods like tobacco, alcohol and hazardous products.

The Center for Democracy & Technology and other advocacy groups countered in Friday's filing that Weiser's argument "ignores the dueling research" regarding social media's effect on users.

Citing several academic studies, the groups say research shows "positive and negative impacts of social media use," and that "the science is far from settled."

They add that "the mere fact of the warning label or its frequency may itself serve to chill speech," and that young people "may not understand or may elect to ignore the research to which they are directed, and instead simply stop using the social media platform out of annoyance or misunderstanding."

First Amendment advocates including the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, American Civil Liberties Union and Electronic Frontier Foundation also weighed in against the law, arguing in a separate friend-of-the-court brief that the statute is unconstitutional.

The law forces platforms "to voice Colorado’s state-selected view that their lawful expression is harmful to minors’ health," those groups write.

"Left unchecked, unconstitutional governmental intrusions into private speech similar to HB 24-1136 will invade all aspects of digital speech," the free speech watchdogs argue. "It is all too easy to imagine that, if states are granted the power, they will seek to append 'disclosure requirements' to all manner of online speech about issues of the day."

The 10th Circuit has not yet scheduled oral arguments in the matter.