Law / United States / 
Texas
HB 18 (2023), Securing Children Online through Parental Empowerment (SCOPE) Act
In force since partly blocked by a court, under challenge in court.
A social media and minors rule binding private bodies.
- Private right of action
- No
- Audit expectation
- none
- Court action
A suit challenging this law is pending. No court has blocked it. Premium data
What it requires
- A federal court enjoined the monitoring and filtering requirement for the two trade associations that sued and their members, and on a Fifth Circuit panel affirmed that injunction because Section 230 preempts the requirement and vacated the order that had enjoined the Act's targeted advertising, unlawful advertising and age-verification requirements; on the full court granted rehearing en banc and vacated that panel opinion, so both of the district court's injunctions again govern: the monitoring and filtering requirement is enjoined for the two trade associations and their members, and the order enjoins the targeted advertising, unlawful advertising, age-verification and monitoring-and-filtering requirements. What follows is what the Act requires of a provider outside those injunctions.
- Applies to digital service providers whose services are used, or reasonably anticipated to be used, by a known minor in Texas.
- Determine whether a Texas account holder is a known minor based on the age they self report at registration.no control in the NIST Privacy Framework
- Unless a verified parent provides otherwise, by default limit data collection and use, and restrict targeted advertising, data sharing and specified design features, for known minors.NIST Privacy FrameworkGV.PO-P2
These lines are LexLint's reading of the law's text. Also read by: Texas Attorney General, Consumer Protection Division (guidance, recorded ); Computer & Communications Industry Ass'n v. Paxton, No. 24-50721 (5th Cir. ) (recorded ).
In the frameworks
- NIST Privacy Framework
- GV.PO-P2Processes to instill organizational privacy values within system/product/service development and operations are established and in place.
Our reading of where this law's duties sit in each framework, and in the NIST Privacy Framework, line by line beside each duty above. It never says that running a control meets the law. How we read a framework against the law
Who enforces it
Enforcement body
Texas Attorney General
Litigation
- Court
- U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas; U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
- Docket
- Computer & Communications Industry Association and NetChoice v. Paxton, No. 1:24-cv-00849 (W.D. Tex.), and Students Engaged in Advancing Texas v. Paxton (W.D. Tex.); consolidated appeals Nos. 24-50721 and 25-50096 (5th Cir.)
- Posture
- The district court preliminarily enjoined the monitoring and filtering provisions on in the CCIA and NetChoice case, and on enjoined additional provisions, including targeted advertising restrictions and the age verification and content monitoring requirement, in the companion Students Engaged in Advancing Texas case, holding them facially invalid under strict scrutiny. On the Fifth Circuit affirmed the first order as to the two trade associations on the ground that Section 230 preempts the monitoring and filtering requirement, and vacated the second order because the Students Engaged in Advancing Texas plaintiffs lack standing to challenge the monitoring and filtering, targeted advertising and unlawful advertising requirements and their challenge to the age-verification requirement is foreclosed by precedent. On the full Fifth Circuit granted rehearing en banc, with oral argument on a date to be fixed, and vacated the panel opinion, so both preliminary injunctions again govern while the appeal is reheard.
Settledness
A Fifth Circuit panel opinion of affirmed the injunction of the monitoring and filtering requirement for the two trade associations and remanded in part. On the full court granted rehearing en banc and vacated that opinion, so the latest decision read is that order and the appeal is pending. The district court's two preliminary injunctions govern meanwhile.
- As of
- Case link
- https://www.ca5.uscourts.gov/opinions/pub/24/24-50721-CV0.pdf
- Guidance link
- https://www.texasattorneygeneral.gov/consumer-protection/file-consumer-complaint/consumer-privacy-rights/securing-children-online-through-parental-empowerment
- Case citation
- Computer & Communications Industry Ass'n v. Paxton, No. 24-50721 (5th Cir. )
- Guidance body
- Texas Attorney General, Consumer Protection Division
- Under challenge
- Yes
- Open questions
- Will the en banc Fifth Circuit hold, as the vacated panel opinion did, that Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act preempts the monitoring and filtering requirement of section 509.053, and for which providers?
What it reaches
Age threshold
18
Covered services
Digital service providers whose services are used, or reasonably anticipated to be used, by a known minor in Texas.
Verification methods
Self declaration, Parental consent
What it makes you log
Who may demand the log
Data subject
What the log must hold
Age assurance result
Logging duty
Chapter 509 uses no word like log or record. It requires a provider to hold the age each person registers before creating an account, to treat a person who registers as under 18 as a known minor until the 18th birthday, and to bar changes to the registered age unless a commercially reasonable review process runs, which a provider cannot do without a stored age and a record of changes. The harm-prevention strategy duties in 509.053(b) (maintained lists, filtering, human monitoring reviews) concern content filtering rather than an age record, and the monitoring and filtering requirement is enjoined in part.
- Kind
- Implicit
- As of
- Provision
- Tex. Bus. & Com. Code section 509.051(a) to (e) (HB 18, 2023)
- Trigger
- age_assurance
What this law does
Requires digital service providers to determine whether a Texas account holder is a known minor based on self reported age at registration, and, unless a verified parent provides otherwise, by default limit data collection and use, and restrict targeted advertising, data sharing, and specified design features for known minors.
A federal court enjoined the monitoring and filtering requirement for the two trade associations that sued, and on the Fifth Circuit affirmed that injunction on the ground that Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act preempts the requirement. The same opinion vacated a second order that had enjoined the targeted advertising, unlawful advertising and age-verification requirements.
On the full Fifth Circuit granted rehearing en banc and vacated that panel opinion, so the appeal will be reheard by the full court. With the panel opinion vacated, the district court's preliminary injunctions of and again govern while the full court rehears the appeal.
How courts have read itPremium data
Our analysis of this law draws on 3 court rulings.
What each ruling held, what it means for an app, and whether it still stands are premium data, in the Plus, Pro and Enterprise plans.
When LexLint raises it
When your app profile says your app operates a social platform.
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