Age assurance faceoff between Apple, Meta notches up with Utah app store law

Utah’s governor has signed the App Store Accountability Act, making it law. A piece from CNBC says S.B. 142, which puts the onus on mobile app stores to conduct age assurance, is the first of its kind in the U.S. and represents “a significant shift in how user ages are verified online.”

The shift in question transfers the age assurance spotlight from platforms like Instagram and X to Apple and Google. Predictably, Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, is celebrating the law as a win, along with X and Snap.

A joint statement from the three companies argues that “parents want a one-stop-shop to oversee and approve the many apps their teens want to download, and Utah has led the way in centralizing it within a device’s app store. This approach spares users from repeatedly submitting personal information to countless individual apps and online services.”

Or, in common parlance, let the app stores worry about it.

They have begun to. In recent weeks, both Apple and Google have published statements on the question of age assurance. Apple has introduced a system that allows parents to select an age range for their child, thereby giving them consent to use apps in that category – a way to provide age assurance without collecting personal information. Google has quietly slipped into the Australian government’s Age Assurance Technology Trial.

That said, both have publicly voiced the opinion that age assurance is best done by websites and platforms.

The notion has picked up steam internationally, with Singapore recently imposing age check requirements on app stores.

Meta battling to wash hands of age assurance, implicate Apple

Utah’s law is slated to go into effect on May 7, but there is a high likelihood it will be challenged. CNBC says the state “passed a similar age verification law related to pornography in 2023, and arguments whether that law violates free speech were heard by the Supreme Court in January.”

Moreover, as Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta becomes more aggressive in its antagonism – a CNBC investigation says Meta has recently shifted its policy strategy to “seek strategic advantages for itself and shift antitrust scrutiny onto Apple” – both Google and Apple will seek to leverage their own considerable heft.

A recent blog from Google’s Director of Public Policy Kareem Ghanem says “there are a variety of fast-moving legislative proposals being pushed by Meta and other companies in an effort to offload their own responsibilities to keep kids safe to app stores. These proposals introduce new risks to the privacy of minors, without actually addressing the harms that are inspiring lawmakers to act.”

Article Topics

age verification  |  app stores  |  digital identity  |  legislation  |  United States  |  Utah