Judge blocks Louisiana’s social media age verification law

A Louisiana law that would have required social media platforms to verify the ages of their users has been blocked by a judge. The law, known as the Secure Online Child Interaction and Age Limitation, was passed in 2023 and required Meta, Reddit, Snap, YouTube Discord and others to implement age verification and parental control features.

The ruling came just days before the law, which technically took effect over the summer, would have started to be enforced. In his ruling, Judge John W. deGravelles wrote that the law’s “age-verification and parental-consent requirements are both over- and under-inclusive,” and that its definition of “social media platform” was “nebulous.”

The ruling was a victory for NetChoice, a lobbying group that represents the tech industry and has challenged the growing number of age verification laws around the world. The group had argued that the law was unconstitutional and posed a safety and security risk.

In a statement following the ruling, the group pointed to the “massive privacy risk” posed by the Louisiana law and others like it. “Louisiana’s law would have done more than chill speech,” Paul Taske, the co-director of NetChoice’s Litigation Center said. “It would have created a massive privacy risk for Louisianans like those playing out in real time in countries without a First Amendment, like the UK.”

The Louisiana Attorney General’s office didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.