'Our youth are addicted': Legislature advances pair of social media regulations

SALT LAKE CITY — Legislative committees on Wednesday approved a pair of bills to revamp Utah's social media regulations following emotional testimony from those who say they've been harmed by online platforms.

The Legislature passed new regulations on social media last year, but following lawsuits from residents and industry groups, lawmakers have proposed changes they say will better withstand legal challenges. The new bills would require companies to determine the ages of users and turn off certain features for accounts held by minors, and also require platforms to enable "supervisory tools like usage of time and mandatory breaks," said Sen. Mike McKell, R-Spanish Fork, the sponsor of SB194.

"The main goals of this bill first and foremost is to protect minors on social media by defaulting their accounts to the highest privacy settings," McKell told the Senate Business and Labor Committee.

McKell made the case for his bill along with a couple of researchers who linked social media use to rising numbers of mental health problems among teens.

He was also joined by Karl and Brittney Obray, whose teenage son, Dexton, died by suicide in 2022. Brittney said she found "horrific" videos on her son's TikTok account and described an apparent rabbit hole of content glorifying and encouraging self-harm her son had been dragged into.

"We had no answers, no signs, nothing," Brittney Obray said tearfully. "He would have been 16 this coming week, and I'll never get to see him drive or reach the big milestones every parent looks forward to."

"Our youth are addicted to their phones," Karl Obray said, talking of the algorithms designed to maximize engagement on most social media apps. "There's so much more work to do. ... Much more needs to be done to these companies to hold them responsible for the things they know they're doing."

While McKell presented his bill to senators, a companion bill sponsored by Rep. Jordan Teuscher, R-South Jordan, was presented to the House Judiciary Committee. Teuscher said the bills are "narrowly tailored in a way that allow for them to withold judicial scrutiny," after lawmakers saw legal challenges to last year's bills and similar laws in other states.

His bill, HB464, allows for private legal action against platforms for harms caused by algorithms and other "engagement driven design elements" such as autoplay, infinite scrolling and push notifications. The bill, however, creates a safe harbor for platforms that limit screen time for minors and disable those harmful elements, among other things.

McKell said this year's bills are designed to do a similar thing to versions passed last year but are focused more on allegedly harmful design features, rather than parental consent for minors who want to use social media.

Both Teuscher and McKell played a short video recorded by U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, who warned of the potential negative effects of social media use by teens.

"Until now, the entire burden of managing social media's harms has fallen on the shoulders of young people and parents," Murthy said. "That is unacceptable. It is past time that public health leaders and policymakers have their backs."

The Obrays also testified in favor of HB464. Karl Obray told representatives he wants to see companies held accountable for the harms caused by their platforms.

"They have caused so much heartache for us, and many more kids will be lost if we don't change it," he said.

Both HB464 and SB194 were approved in committees and will now head to the House and Senate floors, respectively, for further consideration.

Correction: An earlier version of this article incorrectly spelled Brittney Obray's name as Britney.

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