SALT LAKE CITY — A federal judge in Utah has blocked the state’s controversial new Minor Protection in Social Media Act, which was set to go into effect Oct. 1.
The law is part of a package of measures passed by Utah legislators to enact sweeping online censorship, particularly of adult content, under the justification of “protecting minors.”
Chief Judge Robert J. Shelby issued a written order Tuesday granting a preliminary injunction sought by tech industry trade group NetChoice, local LDS Church-aligned newspaper Deseret News reported.
In recent years, Utah has often led other states in implementing anti-porn legislation. In practice, the state has little separation between church, state, press, education and business, and the Mormon church — with which a majority of Utahns claim affiliation — has resisted scientific, evidence-based and parent-focused approaches to protecting children online.
As XBIZ reported, the LDS Church has actively promoted “porn filters” in Utah and nationwide, based on church elders’ theological belief that all porn — a term that for them encompasses all depictions of sexuality outside of the Mormon marriage — is a ploy by Satan to destroy Mormon households.
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The Minor Protection in Social Media Act law is a parallel measure to age verification and porn filter laws, as it targets social media platforms that could bypass porn-specific gatekeeping by claiming that most of their content is not of an explicit sexual nature.
Under the law, Deseret News explained, “social media companies would have been required to enable the maximum default privacy settings on Utah children’s accounts. The companies would have had to verify the ages of their users and also restrict the visibility of Utah children’s accounts, including by disabling search engine indexing.”
Such laws, critics have pointed out in this and similar cases in other states, have a chilling effect on free speech, driving platforms to overmoderate to the point of effectively becoming corporate censors, particularly when controversial content such as porn is involved.
According to Shelby’s ruling, those arguing in favor of the law failed to prove that the Minor Protection in Social Media Act helps parents who claim to be caught “in a losing battle against social media companies for the attention and well-being of their own children.”
The evidence, Shelby added, “is far from clear that the Act’s restrictions meet a substantial need of parents who wish to restrict their children’s access to social media services and cannot do otherwise.”
The law was previously challenged in court on First Amendment grounds, until legislators redrafted it this year to avoid similar situations.
Utah’s controversial Attorney General Sean Reyes said through a statement, “We’re disappointed in the district court’s decision preliminarily enjoining Utah’s Minor Protection in Social Media Act. The AG’s office is analyzing the ruling to determine next steps. We remain committed to protecting Utah’s youth from social media’s harmful effects.”
NetChoice’s top litigator, Chris Marchese, said, “Utah’s law not only violates the First Amendment, but if enforced would backfire and endanger the very people it’s meant to help. We look forward to seeing this law, and others like it, permanently struck down and online speech and privacy fully protected across the country. The District Court’s thoughtful decision highlights just how flawed this law is at its core. With this now sixth injunction against these overreaching laws, we hope policymakers will focus on meaningful and constitutional solutions for the digital age.”
In March, the Utah legislature passed a separate bill establishing liability for electronics manufacturers worldwide should they fail to install and activate a default anti-porn filter on devices sold in the Mormon-majority state. SB 104 was introduced by Utah’s leading anti-porn crusader, Republican state Sen. Todd Weiler. Another persistent Republican anti-porn activist, Rep. Susan Pulsipher, sponsored the bill’s House counterpart.
Weiler said SB 104 was “intended to protect children from developing an addiction to pornography,” though the pseudoscientific notion of porn addiction has been repeatedly debunked by public health scientists.
“Are we winning the war against pornography?” Weiler told the Salt Lake City Weekly in July. “No. Will we ever win it? Probably not. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do what we can.”