HR6333-119

What This Bill Does

The Parents Over Platforms Act creates a federal child-safety regime for connected-device app ecosystems. It defines application distribution providers, developers, covered applications, covered websites, connected devices, minors, adults, age categories, age signals, and personalized advertising. App distribution providers must let parents prevent minors from acquiring or using covered applications, let developers block minors, host centralized information about app parental controls, comply with developer duties for their own covered apps, and avoid using compliance data from third-party apps for anticompetitive self-preferencing. Covered app developers must tell app stores whether their apps treat adults and minors differently or are adult-only, provide privacy and online-safety setting information, use commercially reasonable age determination, restrict minor access to adult-only features or legally age-gated content, obtain parental consent where required, and stop delivering personalized advertising to minors. The bill gives app stores and operating-system providers good-faith liability protection for erroneous or unavailable age signals and related compliance efforts, makes developers responsible for identifying covered apps and properly using age signals, treats violations as FTC unfair-or-deceptive-act rule violations, and preempts related state and local requirements.

Who Benefits and How

Parents benefit because app stores must provide controls to block minor acquisition or use of covered apps and developers must disclose parental controls. Minor children benefit from restrictions on adult-only app features, age-gated content, and personalized advertising. Application distribution providers benefit from federal preemption and liability protection for good-faith age-signal compliance. Operating-system providers benefit from similar protection when age-signal technology fails or produces errors. Multi-state developers benefit from one federal standard instead of a patchwork of state rules.

Who Bears the Burden and How

Covered application developers must classify their apps, report covered status to app stores, provide safety-setting information, estimate user age, honor age signals, obtain parental consent for certain minor access, and stop personalized ads to minors. Application distribution providers must build parental blocking tools, developer-blocking tools, centralized product-page interfaces, and compliance safeguards against anticompetitive data use. Digital advertising networks lose revenue opportunities from minor-targeted personalized advertising. The Federal Trade Commission must enforce the new rules under its unfair-or-deceptive-act authority. State legislatures and regulators lose room to maintain different requirements related to the Act.

Key Provisions

• Defines covered app ecosystem actors, age categories, age signals, connected devices, covered applications, covered websites, and personalized advertising.
• Requires app distribution providers to offer parent-facing and developer-facing controls that can block minor access to covered apps.
• Requires covered app developers to disclose age-differentiated features, use reasonable age estimation, honor age signals, obtain consent for restricted minor access, and prohibit personalized advertising to minors.
• Provides good-faith liability protection for application distribution providers and operating-system providers handling age signals.
• Authorizes FTC enforcement and preempts related state and local laws.