A Texas judge found a law blocking teens from viewing certain content on social media to be too vague.
Many parents might not like this ruling, but a federal court judge on Friday ruled that social media firms cannot be forced to block certain content from teens. The court was brought into the situation after tech companies challenged a new Texas law called the Securing Children Online Through Parental Empowerment (SCOPE) Act. The law demands that social media platforms verify the age of their users and adds other policies that social media firms need to follow.
The law was supposed to take effect Sunday. September 1st, but the ruling by Judge Robert Pitman called out the “monitoring and filtering” requirements as a threat to speech online. Besides verifying a user’s age, the Scope Act limits the collection of data from those under 18, prevents teens from viewing targeted ads, and also prevents them from entering into any financial transaction without parental approval.
