The Battle for Child Safety Online: Washington State Takes on Big Tech

In the quiet town of Olympia, Washington, Aaron Ping grapples with an unfathomable loss. His 16-year-old son Avery, a compassionate teen who dreamed of becoming a psychiatrist and had a special talent for noticing when others were struggling, died of an MDMA overdose after seeking the drug on Snapchat. Aaron believes his son’s addiction to screens led to the impulsive behavior that ultimately cost him his life. “For a developing teenage brain, it’s going to be training that brain for impulsive behavior,” Aaron explains, his voice heavy with both grief and determination. “Dopamine reward schedules, it has a really harmful effect on the developing mind.” This personal tragedy has transformed Aaron into an advocate for House Bill 1834, a measure designed to establish safeguards for children navigating the treacherous waters of the digital world.

The proposed legislation aims to protect young users in several meaningful ways. It would prohibit popular platforms like Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok from serving “addictive feeds” to minors, though youth would still be able to search for specific content and follow accounts of interest. Companies would also be barred from sending push notifications to minors during overnight hours or school hours without parental consent. The Senate passed its version of the bill last year with bipartisan support, but it stalled in the House amid constitutional and privacy concerns. State Attorney General Nick Brown requested the legislation, which also had the backing of Governor Bob Ferguson, who as attorney general sued both TikTok and Meta over their practices targeting youth users. These cases remain ongoing as lawmakers and advocates, including former tech executives, renew their push for these guardrails in Washington state.

Not surprisingly, the tech industry opposes these measures. Rose Feliciano, executive director of TechNet in the Northwest, claims that while the organization and its member companies are committed to safe online experiences for young people, the bill “would limit companies’ ability to offer the full range of parental controls needed to help keep children safe.” TechNet represents major players including Amazon, Apple, Netflix, Meta, and Google. Another tech lobbying group, NetChoice, argues that such legislation replaces “parental judgment with state diktat” and violates First Amendment protections. They advocate instead for digital literacy programs and parental guidance rather than government regulation. Children’s Alliance Executive Director Soleil Boyd counters that advocates have worked diligently to ensure the legislation is “legally defensible and really will make a difference,” pointing out that algorithms targeting young people to maximize screen time are “more than most parents can do to really fight and combat that.”

The push for regulation gains powerful support from industry insiders like Kelly Stonelake, who worked at Meta for nearly 15 years, including leading the expansion of the company’s virtual reality software to youth users. Once a believer in the tech industry’s ability to self-regulate, Stonelake’s perspective transformed after witnessing what she describes as troubling practices within Meta. She recalls an “open secret” that children were using products without parental oversight, resulting in illegal data collection, with company concerns focused on corporate interests rather than user safety. “The executive team got into the product to play test it and kind of understand it better ourselves, but we could not even hear one another over the sounds of screaming children,” she reveals. Stonelake, who believes she was laid off for raising concerns and is now suing Meta, has become a passionate advocate for “common-sense regulations that we need to protect kids,” stating bluntly, “Because I’ve seen firsthand that these companies won’t.”

The statistics underscore the urgency of the issue. In 2023, approximately 70% of Washington 10th graders reported using social media several times daily, with these students likely experiencing worse academic performance. Nearly half showed risk factors for “problematic internet use” that could lead to risky behavior and reduced sleep, while 8% reported increased social anxiety due to their online activities. Bill sponsor Representative Lisa Callan emphasizes prevention: “If we can get way upstream and we can prevent it from happening in the first place, and this is exactly that. Let’s prevent some anxiety and depression from happening in the first place.” The U.S. Surgeon General has similarly recommended limiting social media access to protect youth mental health and online privacy. Washington lawmakers are also considering additional measures, including requiring parental consent for social media accounts for users 16 and younger, and a proposed tax on social media companies to fund youth behavioral health care.

As Washington state moves forward with these regulations, it enters a complex legal landscape. The proposed measure is modeled after a California ban on addictive feeds that has thus far withstood court scrutiny, with the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upholding the requirement of parental consent for minors to access such feeds. Nevertheless, Meta, Google, and TikTok have filed lawsuits to block the California law, and tech groups argue that regulating internet content for minors violates constitutional protections. Seann Colgan, a state assistant attorney general focused on consumer protection, defends the Washington bill against First Amendment concerns: “It doesn’t restrict kids’ access to speech. Kids can still access the speech, they just need to look for it themselves instead of having it fed to them in an addictive manner.” As this battle between child safety advocates and tech giants unfolds in Washington state, it represents just one front in a broader national conversation about how to protect young people in an increasingly digital world—a conversation that comes too late for Avery Ping, but may yet prevent similar tragedies for countless others.