alt Hacker NewsJudge Robert Pitman said that it violates the First Amendment and is "more likely than not - unconstitutional."
The Act is akin to a law that would require every bookstore to verify
the age of every customer at the door and, for minors, require parental
consent before the child or teen could enter and again when they try to
purchase a book.
Replies
The technical implementation is messy too. Most age verification systems either don't work well or create massive privacy risks by requiring government ID uploads.
> "would require every bookstore to verify the age of every customer at the door and, for minors..."
It's a dumb law, but, devil's advocate - isn't that how porn shops work? And porn shops also sell some non-porn items, too.
It is difficult to square the notional unconstitutionality of this with the fact that the exercise of other Constitutional rights have long been conditional on age. This just looks like another example.
What is the consistent principle of law? I am having difficulty finding one that would support this ruling.
Judges are struggling to find the analogies known to them from the world of 70's. Apps are not like books only. They are like movies, sports, tools, postal mailbox, pet, friend, bank, money, shop, cab and anything you can imagine. When movies require age-restriction, apps can do so too.
Age gates at the App Store level aren't a narrow restriction, they're a universal checkpoint
All of us in the EU could learn something from this judge's ruling and from the Constitution. The EU is on the fast-track to turning into a vast surveillance state the way things have been going (the increasing rise of arresting people who post mean things on the internet, Chat Control, age restrictions now rolling out in Denmark).
We love to regulate here in the EU and now that love of regulation is being weaponized against its own people.
As a UK subject, with a government that has begun implementing the online safety act, prosecuting people for tweets that clearly weren't inciting violence and getting rid of jury trials for cases with fewer than five years sentences, I look on with envy at your constitutional protections of the individual.
False analogy given by this federal judge. App stores are gateways to social environments and unknown or future content. Every book in a bookstore can be verified because the content can be known and audited. Regardless of opinion on the root issue, this judges statement aligns books with the Internet and they are absolutely not the same.
That is exactly the case for movies, yes?
Movie theatres require a chaperon for minors for R rated films? (And theatres often block some ages entirely.)
I hope we can use the First Amendment and freedom of assembly to tackle these ID age verification (read: 1984 surveillance) laws. I don't have faith that this will work.
We need to amend the constitution to guarantee our privacy. It should be a fundamental right.
For those curious about the "consistent principle of law" here - SCOTUS wrestled with nearly exactly this question in Free Speech Coalition v. Paxton earlier this year, and effectively emboldened more of these laws.
Previously the Fifth Circuit had relied heavily on Ginsberg v. New York (1968) to justify rational basis review. But Ginsberg was a narrow scope - it held that minors don't have the same First Amendment rights as adults to access "obscene as to minors" material. It wasn't about burdens on adults at all. Later precedent (Ashcroft, Sable, Reno, Playboy) consistently applied strict scrutiny when laws burdened adults' access to protected speech, even when aimed at protecting minors.
In Paxton the majority split the difference and applied intermediate scrutiny - a lower bar than strict - claiming the burden on adults is merely "incidental." Kagan had a dissent worth reading, arguing this departs from precedent even if the majority won't frame it that way. You could call it "overturning" or "distinguishing" depending on how charitable you're feeling.
The oral arguments are worth watching if you want to understand how to grapple with these questions: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ckoCJthJEqQ
On 1A: The core concern isn't that age-gating exists - it's that mandatory identification to access legal speech creates chilling effects and surveillance risks that don't exist when you flash an ID at a liquor store.
Note: IANAL but do enjoy reading many SC transcripts