ALBANY, N.Y. — New York has become the latest state to consider legislation that would require adult sites to verify the ages of users seeking to access adult content.
State Senator Jake Ashby and State Assemblymember Mary Beth Walsh, both Republicans, introduced identical companion bills in the Senate and Assembly that would require any site hosting content deemed harmful to minors to verify the ages of users.
The bills mirror other age verification legislation being promoted around the country by religious conservative activists, with some variations. For instance, while AV bills and laws in some other states specify that one-third of a site’s content must fall under the “harmful to minors” category in order for those laws to apply, the New York version simply says that sites hosting “any sexual material harmful to minors” would be subject to the new law.
Other states’ versions also vary in terms of enforcement. While some assign enforcement to the state, others enable civil suits — a strategy that avoids potential legal wrangles over state enforcement. The New York version authorizes the state attorney general to impose a civil penalty of up to $50,000 per day on sites that fail to comply.
The bills will next be reviewed by the New York legislature’s Assembly Consumer Affairs and Protection Committee, and by the Senate Internet and Technology Committee.
A recent copycat AV bill in New Mexico stalled out in that state’s House Commerce & Economic Development Committee raised issues with the bill in committee session that highlighted the same legal, technical and privacy concerns that free speech and privacy advocates have consistently raised in connection with other age verification bills and laws around the country.
The status of many of those bills and laws may be determined when the Supreme Court rules in Free Speech Coalition v. Paxton, the FSC-led challenge to Texas’ age verification law. Oral arguments in that case took place Jan. 15.
