Highlights
On June 18th, the Institute for Family Studies submitted another amicus brief in support of Texas’s “App Store Accountability Act,” this time in support of the state’s ability to enforce the law while it awaits the Fifth Circuit’s decision regarding the law’s constitutionality. The case in question involves an emergency appeal by the plaintiffs to the Supreme Court after the 5th Circuit overturned a lower court’s injunction against the law pending its ruling on the merits. The plaintiffs want the law to be kept from going into effect until the Fifth Circuit decides the case. We filed our brief in support of Texas and the 5th Circuit’s decision to allow the law to go into effect and hold app stores and developers accountable.
Our amicus brief affirms the 5th Circuit’s assessment that “[t]he need to protect children is intensified in the digital world.” As we argued in our previous amicus, our latest brief outlines the way digital technologies and spaces like app stores have undermined parental authority. This is especially the case in app stores where, as the federal court put it,
parents’ ability to protect their children is imperiled because app stores have encouraged minors to download applications and make in-app purchases without giving parents accurate content information or obtaining their informed consent.
We also reiterated that courts have never recognized a right of corporations to speak to minors without parents present and that the Supreme Court has recognized age verification technologies as “plainly legitimate.”
Because of this, we believe the 5th Circuit was right to judge that, “[t]he balance of equities and public interest are clearcut in Texas's favor,” and thus overturn the District Court's injunction. We hope the Supreme Court will uphold the federal court’s decision and allow the law to go into effect until a ruling on the merits is issued.
Jared Hayden is a Policy Analyst for the IFS Family First Tech Initiative.
*Photo credit: Shutterstock
