Bulk of bills designed to protect kids on social media now heads to U.S. House

FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) -- This week, the U.S. Senate passed a number of bills aimed at protecting kids online, designed to beef up privacy protections for young users. It would also limit targeted advertisement.

The Kids Online Safety Act and the Children and Teens Online Privacy Protection Act now head to the House.

"It's been a difficult road," said Amy Neville with the group of ParentSOS. "But we have to save lives. This is for the future. If we had only known then what we know now, we'd be living a very different life."

Neville lost her 14-year-old son Alexander four years ago to fentanyl poisoning after he met a drug dealer through Snapchat.

She believes if there had been laws in place for social media companies, her son would still alive.

"We all really feel strongly about the fact that," said Neville. "Had something like KOSA been in place prior to our children's death, that maybe we'd still have them here with us."

On Tuesday, the Senate overwhelmingly passed a group of bills that would put safeguards in place.

However, there is concern that the bills could infringe on free speech.

"The concern from a First Amendment perspective is that a lot of the time, these topics are entirely protected speech," said Jason Kelley with the Electronic Frontier Foundation. "From the perspective of a young person, they're often helpful. So what the bill is going to do is impact what kinds of information people can see online on social media."

If signed into law, tech companies would be required to create steps to prevent potentially harmful content from reaching children.

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Kelley says this would limit access to information.

"When people go online who are under 17, a lot of the time, their experience online is primarily through something like Tik Tok or Instagram," said Kelley. "That means that they would see essentially a different world than they see today."

But who's responsible for regulating what kids see on social media?

Cheryl Gardner, an assistant professor for media and journalism at Fresno State University, weighs in.

"I think the responsibility kind of lies with everyone," said Gardner. "What are we producing? What are platforms allowing? How are those algorithms working?"

Several Central Valley families tell Action News they would like to see protections for children on social media.

"We need a protection," said Saul Zepeda of Fresno. "Everybody needs protection. Kids, adults, teenagers, and everything."

"We can do all the regulations," said Gardner, "we can require platforms to change their habits and their behaviors with the algorithms. But there is always going to be that risk."

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