POPA and the Fight Over the Permission-Slip Internet
The fight over how to protect children online under the First Amendment has intensified in the opening weeks of the year. Two product-liability trials recently began asking whether social-media services such as Instagram and YouTube qualify as unsafe products for minors because of allegedly defective design features. At the same time, federal and state lawmakers have introduced bills that would impose liability on app stores if they fail to verify users’ ages and obtain parental consent before minors download apps.
Debate has largely centered on who should bear responsibility for harms to children online: the app stores or the apps themselves. The more important question, though, is when liability makes sense at all.
This post examines that question through a law & economics lens, with particular attention to H.R. 6333, the Parents Over Platforms Act (POPA). Sponsored by Reps. Jake Auchincloss (D-Mass.) and Erin Houchin (R-Ind.) the bill cleared the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Commerce, Manufacturing, and Trade in December and now awaits consideration by the full committee.