According to AppleInsider, the U.S. government is pushing the App Store Accountability Act (ASA), introduced in May by Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) and Rep. John James (R-MI), to force app stores like Apple’s and Google’s to verify the age of all users. The bill, part of a nine-bill package discussed in a late November House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing, would require accounts for minors to be linked to a parental account for consent on downloads and purchases. The goal is to create uniform federal rules, superseding state laws like California’s. The catch? Apple’s existing Family Sharing system, detailed in a July update for iOS 26, already lets parents create managed accounts for kids under 13, control content, and require approval for apps and purchases. The company even shares a child’s age range with developers for tailored content. So, lawmakers are essentially demanding a solution that’s been live for years.
The blame game shift
Here’s the thing that really gets me about this bill. It’s not really about adding new protections. It’s about shifting legal liability. Right now, the responsibility for moderating content and protecting kids falls primarily on the app developers and services themselves—Facebook, TikTok, that sketchy game with in-app purchases. And that’s where it should be. But the ASA would make Apple and Google the first line of defense and, by extension, the first target for blame. As the article points out, if a social network’s terrible moderation lets explicit content through, it won’t be the social network’s fault anymore. It’ll be Apple’s, because the App Store “didn’t verify age properly.” That’s ridiculous. It’s like blaming the mall because a store inside it sold someone a Snickers bar and they had a peanut allergy. The bill literally lets the actual bad actors off the hook, and companies like Pinterest are already endorsing it for that exact reason. They get a free pass.
Age verification is a mess
And let’s talk about the core mechanic here: age verification. How do you actually do that in a privacy-protecting way for a kid? Apple currently uses a credit card check on the parent’s account when setting up a child profile. But that only works at the account creation stage. The bigger, unsolvable problem? Device sharing. A parent hands their unlocked iPad, logged into *their* adult account, to a kid to watch videos. No age check in the App Store will ever stop that child from opening Safari and going anywhere. The bill protects the *account*, not the *device*. So we’re adding friction and complexity for a solution with a giant, obvious loophole. Real safety would require age checks at the service level, inside each app. But that’s hard, so politicians are going for the easy, visible target: the App Store front door.
The UK shows why this fails
We don’t have to guess how this plays out. We have a real-world example: the UK’s Online Safety Act. Since it kicked in this past summer, it’s been a disaster. Websites like Imgur just blocked UK users entirely. Others implemented laughably bad age checks—requiring a credit card or ID, or using webcam age estimation that was easily fooled. People bypassed Discord’s check by pointing a camera at a rendered face from the game Death Stranding. The result? A spike in VPN use and a major privacy risk, all while making the internet worse for everyone. That’s the template. Good intentions, poorly considered fixes, and unintended consequences that hurt regular users. The U.S. is marching right down the same path.
Political theater over practical solutions
Look, protecting kids online is a just goal. Nobody’s arguing against that. But this bill feels like political theater. It ignores existing solutions (Apple’s Family Sharing), misunderstands where responsibility should lie (on content hosts, not storefronts), and will likely create a worse, more fragmented user experience for everyone. It’s lawmakers trying to “do something” about a complex tech issue they don’t fully grasp. The remedy, as the UK proved, can easily become worse than the disease. Instead of creating new laws that miss the point, maybe they should first look at what’s already working on the devices in their own pockets.
