WPBN: Currently, communities throughout Tennessee are being impacted by 19 new state laws. But after a judge approved a motion for a preliminary injunction, one of those statutes is currently in limbo.
It is one of two new rules designed to protect children when they use the internet. Both of them need age verification to ensure that users are at least eighteen years old or have parental consent.
Senator Massey was the primary proponent of Senate Bill 1792, also referred to as the “Protect Tennessee Minors Act.”
This mandates that websites verify that their users are at least 18 years old. Websites that contain “harmful to minors” content, such as pornography, as much as one-third of their content are subject to this clause.
This obligation does not apply to those who use search engines, internet service providers, or publications and broadcasts that are of public interest.
In accordance with the legislation, website proprietors are required to compare the photograph of a user with a legitimate form of identification, such as a mortgage or educational statement. Should a website be found to be in violation of this, the proprietor would be subject to a Class C criminal conviction.
Concerns about privacy are not the only ones. This statute is being challenged in court by a coalition of individuals and businesses, who claim that it is in violation of both the First and Fourteenth Amendments.
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It was stated that the bill would violate the right to free speech and consider websites to be “adult businesses,” which could have adverse effects such as a loss of advertising revenue and social stigma. At the same time, it stated that the law is “impermissibly vague,” which is a violation of the Due Process Clause.
According to a decision that granted a motion for a preliminary injunction, this law is known as “scorched earth.”
Moreover, the “Protecting Children from Social Media Act,” which is also known as House Bill 1891, mandates that social media platforms check the ages of their members. As soon as a minor opens an account, the corporation must first verify that a parent has provided permission for the account to be created.
No specific instructions are provided regarding the manner in which this should be carried out. According to Representative Jake McCalmon, it is purposefully ambiguous.
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They have the ability to file a complaint with the office of the state attorney general, who will conduct an investigation, if they discover that a social media website has broken this law by enabling a minor to register an account without the permission of their parents.
“several other states” have passed legislation that is comparable to what McCalmon described as having been passed. The law of Louisiana served as the inspiration for Tennessee’s particular version.
Just two of the 19 legislation that are scheduled to take into effect on January 1 are the ones that are being discussed here. A wide variety of subjects are covered by the others, ranging from mandating that landlords provide tenants with specific contact information to modifying the proceedings of juvenile court and many more.
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