Image Credit: Canva
The Tennessee Conservative [By Rebecca Scott] –
House Bill 1891 (HB1891), sponsored by State Representative William Lamberth (R-Portland-District 44), and Senate Bill 2097 (SB2097), sponsored by State Senator Jack Johnson (R-Franklin-District 27), have both been passed out of the committee process with the next step of being heard on the floor of each chamber.
This legislation creates the “Protecting Children from Social Media Act.”
As previously reported by the Tennessee Conservative, this legislation would require social media platforms to use age verification on accounts and obtain parental consent for minors to use those platforms.
Furthermore, it would also require social media companies to ‘verify the express parental consent for the minor to become or continue as an account holder’ if someone under 18 wants to use the platform.
According to the bill, minors would have 14 days from the time they try to log in to complete that age-verification process and social media platforms would be required to provide parents with a means of monitoring the accounts of those minors.
In the House, HB1891 was recommended for passage if amended.
In the Senate, SB2097 was also recommended for passage with amendment by the Senate Commerce and Labor Committee with 7 Ayes being recorded and 1 Nay.
The amendment to the bill provided some clarifying language while also exempting commerce platforms such as Ebay, Venmo, and Paypal from the requirements.
These bills have not yet been placed on the respective calendars of the Tennessee House and Senate upon publication of this article.
