Age Verification and Parental Consent for App Stores

Scripture places the responsibility for guiding children squarely on parents. Proverbs 4:23 instructs us to guard our hearts above all else, and parents cannot guard what they cannot see or control. Today's application stores serve as the primary gateway through which children encounter social media, explicit content, predatory communications, and ideologies hostile to faith and flourishing. HB1275 restores a measure of parental authority at precisely that gateway, requiring age verification and parental consent before a minor can access an app store. This is not a theoretical protection; it is a concrete, enforceable requirement that places parents back in their God-given role.

The bill's scope is deliberately narrow. It does not regulate app content directly, nor does it impose broad internet restrictions. It targets the distribution point where access begins, which is both legally defensible and practically effective. A parent who cannot control what applications a child downloads cannot meaningfully supervise that child's digital life. By requiring consent at the store level, the bill closes a gap that technology companies have long exploited, effectively bypassing parental authority through frictionless, anonymous access.

Critics may argue that age verification burdens legitimate users or raises privacy concerns. Those concerns deserve honest engagement, but they do not outweigh the documented harms flowing from unfiltered minor access to digital platforms. Pornography, predatory contact, and radicalization do not wait for a child to mature. The burden of a consent requirement is modest; the cost of inaction is not.

The American Council urges support for HB1275. Lawmakers who believe that families, not corporations, bear primary responsibility for children's formation should see this bill as an opportunity to make that conviction enforceable. We encourage continued advocacy to see this legislation through the full legislative process and into law.