Ohio Proposes Law Mandating Parental Consent for Children to Access Online Platforms

The logo of the Chinese social media app TikTok is shown in a picture taken in Paris on Dec. 14, 2018. Joel Saget/AFP/Getty Images

Ohio’s Lt. Gov. Jon Husted is proposing a new law that would require certain online services to obtain permission from parents before allowing kids to use their platforms, insisting that such measures are necessary to protect children from harmful content.

The “Social Media Parental Notification Act” requires online companies to create a method to determine whether the user is a child less than 16 years of age, obtain verifiable consent for such users from their parent or legal guardian, and send a written confirmation of the consent to the parent/guardian.

Husted, a Republican, submitted the proposal as part of the governor’s 2023–24 executive budget that was recently presented to the Ohio General Assembly.

The proposed law would apply to social media and online gaming/activity companies. This would bring services like Facebook, YouTube, Snapchat, TikTok, and Instagram under the purview of the law. E-commerce services like online shopping are excluded.

Husted insists that the proposed law is in no way a government overreach but an attempt to protect children of Ohio from disturbing online content and social media addiction.

“Everything in your child’s life needs parental consent. But in the form of social media, one of the most dangerous threats to their social lives right now, there’s nothing. There’s no requirement, and we need to fix that,” he said, according to the Statehouse News Bureau.

Protecting Children From Harmful Content

According to the proposed bill, if the user indicates that they are under the age of 16, online services have six ways to allow parents to verify the information.

This includes accepting a sign on a digital form consenting to the terms of service, using a debit card, credit card, or other online payment systems, connecting to trained personnel through video conference, calling a toll-free number, or checking a form of government-issued identification.

In case the parent or guardian refuses to consent to the terms of service, the platform must deny such services to the child. Once the bill is signed into law by Gov. Mike DeWine, companies will have 90 days to comply with the new requirements.

Speaking to Statehouse News Bureau, Husted pointed out that young children are being exposed to posts like “gender transitioning” as well as being body shamed and bullied. These can be very destructive to a child’s brain, which is only in the developmental stage, he stated.

Husted pointed to the suicide of a 15-year-old boy who had sent a nude photo to an adult mistaking the person for a teen girl, only to get caught up in a money extortion scheme.

“When you know a product is harmful, whether it’s been cigarettes or something else, we’ve had to step in and find ways to limit or mitigate the harmful nature of that product,” Husted said. “And in this particular case, we’re not banning anything. We’re just saying parental notification.”

Social Media Use Among Teenagers

A 2021 study (pdf) by Common Sense Media states that 84 percent of teens in the United States use social media but only 34 percent claim to enjoy social media “a lot.”

In addition, social media use is rising among tweens—children between the ages of 9 and 12—a group “who are technically not supposed to be using social media in the first place,” the study said.

According to a study published in JAMA Pediatrics in January by the University of North Carolina, habitual checking of social media could be affecting the neural development of brains among adolescents, leaving them sensitive to social feedback.

“Social media provides a constant and unpredictable stream of social inputs to adolescents during a critical development period when the brain becomes especially sensitive to social rewards and punishments,” the study said.

“Likes, notifications, and messages arrive unpredictably on a maximally powerful variable reinforcement schedule, conditioning individuals to check social media habitually in anticipation of this social feedback.”