Supreme Court lets Texas enforce law that restricts app purchases by children

The Supreme Court on Monday declined to pause enforcement of a Texas law that restricts which apps children can download from online stores, in a case that involves the balance of online safety for kids and the Constitution’s free-speech guarantees.

Gov. Greg Abbott (R) signed the law last year in an effort to give parents more control over their kids’ app downloads and in-app purchases. It requires users to verify that they’re at least 18 years old; if they are not, minors must receive consent from their parents for every download or in-app purchase. California, Louisiana and Utah have passed similar age-verification laws for app stores.

The high court’s brief, unsigned order allows the law to be enforced while a challenge to it plays out in lower court. The justices did not explain their reasoning.

A federal judge in Texas temporarily blocked the law in December, a week before the law was set to take effect Jan. 1. Judge Robert Pitman sided with a group of minors who claimed the law restricts their access to content in violation of the First Amendment, saying it cut off access to a “universe of speech.”

“The Act is akin to a law that would require every bookstore to verify the age of every customer at the door and, for minors, require parental consent before the child or teen could enter and again when they try to purchase a book,” Pitman wrote.

A panel on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit stayed the ruling, saying Pitman erred in finding a likely free-speech violation. The students then turned to the Supreme Court.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton argued in a brief to the high court that the law is meant to allow parents to direct the upbringing of their children. He also noted that before downloading apps, children are vulnerable to agreeing to terms of service that can include “whether the child’s location will be tracked, whether the child’s privacy will be protected, whether information from the child’s phone can be sold by the developer, and whether the child waives the right to sue.”

Last year, the Supreme Court affirmed another Texas law that requires users to verify their age to access porn sites in a case that similarly weighed children’s safety against free-speech concerns.