One Step Forward, Two Steps Back: CA's AB 1856 Exempts Open Source But Expands Age-Gating

California lawmakers are considering an exemption for open source operating systems from the age-bracketing requirements created by AB 1043. The proposed change would reduce some compliance burdens on open source software. However, AB 1856 would still require web browsers and websites to request and collect users’ ages. This expands the age-gating system beyond operating systems and app stores. The age-gating approach is described as creating barriers to lawful online speech, pressuring services to gather sensitive user data, and threatening anonymity. The bill is also characterized as imposing disproportionate harms on the open source ecosystem that supports much of the modern web.

"Nonetheless, the current bill still jeopardizes internet users' speech, privacy, and security. While the open source exemption, if passed, would improve the law, the remaining amendments proposed by AB 1856 would require all web browsers and websites to request and collect users' ages. This is an expansion of last year's AB 1043's age-bracketing system that compounds its constitutional harms to users' speech, privacy, and security."

"Last year, California passed , which requires all operating systems and app stores to create age-bracketing systems that segment users based on their ages. As we've written , that regime is a recipe for censorship: it creates unnecessary and unconstitutional barriers to accessing lawful online speech, threatens our right to anonymity, and pressures online services to collect troves of valuable and sensitive user data. On top of that, A.B. 1043's wide-sweeping compliance burdens impose disproportionate harms on the open source ecosystem that underpins much of the modern web."

"Given these flaws, lawmakers introduced this year as a supposed "clean-up" bill for AB 1043. But instead of sticking to fixing AB 1043's unique and serious harms (like its impact on open source operating systems), AB 1856 also expanded the regime even further-extending its age-bracketing requirements beyond operating systems and app stores to browsers and websites."

"EFF opposes AB 1856 on two grounds, which we explained in our opposition letter to the Assembly: The harms that age-gating regimes pose to users' speech, privacy, and anonymity; and The disproportionate harms that this particular regime impo"

Read at Electronic Frontier Foundation