Who Protects Children Online?
September 21, 2026
In 2025, Utah became the first state to pass an app store age-verification and parental consent law, the App Store Accountability Act. The law imposes age-verification and parental-consent obligations on app stores and developers with the intention of keeping children safe online.
Under Utah’s amended law, when a user creates an account, app stores must determine the user’s age, then developers must use that information to determine whether the user may download a particular app. Simply relying on children to honestly type a birthday doesn’t count; distributors are responsible for making sure children aren’t getting unrestricted access to inappropriate content. Second, stores and developers must get parental consent before minors download apps or make in-app purchases. This gives parents a meaningful opportunity to approve or decline what their children access. Utah’s app store law goes into effect in 2027.
