Committee hears competing proposals to require parental consent, age verification for app downloads

The Financial Institutions, Insurance, and Technology Committee held multiple hearings on proposals to require age verification and parental consent for app downloads and in‑app purchases.

Sponsor testimony for Senate Bill 167 came from Senator Reynolds, who described an "app store" approach in which a parent could indicate at device setup that an account belongs to a minor, link the child’s account to a parent, and require parental consent for downloads or purchases that pose higher risk. "This bill will solve that problem in a way that is simple for app stores and families to implement," Reynolds said, adding that the Department of Commerce would oversee rulemaking. She and other proponents argued the app‑store approach reduces burdens on smaller developers.

The committee also considered a substitute working document (substitute bill 1271‑3) accepted on Vice Chair Lang’s motion; the summary of that substitute included age‑category verification, parental affiliation, limiting data collection to necessary verification fields, encryption requirements for age verification data, and prohibitions on third‑party sharing except as required by law.

Senator Patton presented Senate Bill 175, a broader measure that would require app stores, developers and operating‑system providers to request age at account creation, declare which features are for adults, limit unnecessary data collection, ban targeted ads for children and provide "user friendly" parental dashboards. "We wanna put parents in control by requiring user friendly parental content filters," Patton said, describing the bill as protecting children without compromising privacy.

Committee members asked about constitutional questions for an app‑by‑app approach, interstate commerce implications, potential impacts on minors seeking reproductive‑health information, and practical enforcement. Senator Mora raised concerns that the bills could restrict access to reproductive‑health information for minors; Senator Reynolds responded that she did not draw the same parallels and emphasized the child‑safety intent. Members discussed collaborating to reconcile the two approaches before advancing legislation. The committee heard proponents but recorded no final votes on either bill that day.