LOS ANGELES, Calif. – Late last month, the Free Speech Coalition (FSC) made a rare move for the organization, throwing its support behind a state age-verification bill being considered by the North Dakota legislature. Unlike other age-verification bills proposed or passed by other states, the North Dakota bill mandated a device-based approach to age-verification, one FSC said at the time would “enable adult websites to block minors from accessing their content while protecting the privacy and security of adult consumers.”
Now, just three weeks later, changes made to the bill have forced the FSC to withdraw its support for the legislation, the organization said in a statement released yesterday.
In the statement, FSC said it is “disappointed by North Dakota legislators’ decision to abandon the common-sense approach to age-verification originally proposed in SB 2380.”
“The bill would have verified the user’s age on a phone, tablet or other device, and made children unable to access to sites with material harmful to minors,” FSC said. “This is the same approach currently being advanced in multiple states for social media.”
FSC added that the “adult industry recognizes that device-based age-verification is the only solution that can effectively prevent children from encountering adult content while protecting the privacy and constitutional rights of adults.”
“We’re disappointed that legislators in South Dakota chose to prioritize the concerns of Big Tech over the needs of their constituents,” the FSC statement concluded.
The FSC statement links to letters sent to the North Dakota legislature by the Broadband Association of North Dakota (BAND), TechNet, NetChoice and the Chamber of Progress, trade associations representing a variety of tech sectors that opposed the draft of the bill earlier supported by FSC.
In her letter to the North Dakota Senate’s Industry and Business Committee, BAND Executive Director Carissa Swenson took direct aim at FSC in arguing against the previous iteration of the bill.
“SB 2380 is being supported by the adult entertainment industry as they do not want the burden of verifying age to visit their websites,” Swenson wrote. “It is concerning to support this group on an agenda they are promoting.”
“We are supportive of preventing minors from accessing inappropriate content; however, this bill is not the solution,” Swenson added. “We believe this bill is BAD policy and would rather see the burden of age verification be put on those websites who provide this explicit content.”
You can read the full text of each of the tech organizations’ letters at the links above. The FSC statement withdrawing its support for the bill is available here. You can track the progress of SB 2380 via the FSC website.
