Federal Court Allows Florida To Enforce Social Media Ban for Children as State Targets Online Predators

As the Sunshine State doubles down on efforts to protect kids online by filing a lawsuit against gaming platform Discord, a federal appeals court says Florida can enforce a law that bans children under 14 from using social media platforms.On Wednesday, a three-judge panel on the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit unanimously lifted a preliminary injunction that blocked HB 3, a state law signed by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis in 2024. The law aims to help protect children from potential harms related to social media use by creating age limits for children under 14 and requiring teens between the ages of 14 and 15 to obtain parental consent to open a social media account.The judges ruled that the law “implicates the First Amendment,” but concluded it imposes a “content-neutral speech restriction” and thus “likely passes First Amendment muster.” The court also found that the law does not “burden substantially more speech than necessary” as it seeks to “protect children from social media addiction and its ensuing effects.” The case now goes back to a lower court.HB 3’s restrictions only apply to platforms that have “been determined to induce heavy use by children” and feature both an algorithm and a series of “addictive features,” such as infinite scrolling and push notifications.A tech trade organization, NetChoice, which brought the challenge against HB 3 said it is “disappointed” by the ruling. “We are currently evaluating all of our options as we continue the fight to ensure Floridians’ rights to free expression online are protected, and parents remain in the driver’s seat when it comes to making decisions for their families,” the director of the NetChoice Litigation Center, Paul Taske, said in a statement.Amid growing concerns about the impact social media has on children, several states have tried to limit minors’ access to the platforms. However, federal courts have typically blocked the laws, finding that they violate the First Amendment. Meanwhile, Florida’s attorney general, James Uthmeier, announced Thursday that the Sunshine State is pursuing a lawsuit against gaming platform Discord for allegedly enabling sex predators to pursue children. Mr. Uthmeier said the state is seeking civil penalties against the “hotbed for predators” for its willful violations of the state’s online laws for children and deceptive and unfair trade practices. “They’ve chosen profit over public safety,” he said, noting that the platform launched as a website for young gamers to communicate has become a “playground for some of the most evil, heinous offenders.”Mr. Uthmeier said Discord does not have “real age verification,” allowing anybody to sign up. He alleged that while Discord has tried to work with the state for the last six months, it is guilty of negligence because it has not built sufficient content moderation systems to detect when adult predators are posing as kids to make contact with prospective victims or engaging in “graphic” and “dangerous” conversations. “If you offend and hurt our kids, we will make everybody pay. So today, it’s Discord; we will see who’s next,” he said standing at a dais that bore the sign “Big Tech Accountability.” A Discord spokeswoman told The New York Sun that Mr. Uthmeier’s complaint “does not reflect the platform we have built or the investments we have made in user safety.” The spokeswoman noted that Discord does not have algorithms or other features seen as addictive, such as infinite scrolling, and said the platform has “recently introduced a platform-wide, age-appropriate experience” that provides protections for teenagers in Discord chats that are not age-restricted. Opponents of the ban on social media argue that parents, not the government, should decide whether their children can access social media. They also point out that some tech companies, such as Apple, have rolled out new tools that make it easier for parents to limit which websites and apps their children can use and for how long. The U.S. Supreme Court has not taken up the debate around social media bans. However, in 2025, the high court rejected NetChoice’s request to temporarily prevent Mississippi from enforcing its law that required children to obtain their parents’ consent to open an account. Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote in a concurrence that the law is “likely unconstitutional.”

Federal Court Allows Florida To Enforce Social Media Ban for Children as State Targets Online Predators

Federal Court Allows Florida To Enforce Social Media Ban for Children as State Targets Online Predators

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