An Act Concerning The Attorney General's Recommendations Regarding Social Media And Minors.
HB 6857 creates a new state law regulating how social media and other online platforms may recommend, select, or prioritize user-generated content for minors. The bill applies to “covered operators” and “covered minors” under age 18, and generally prohibits platforms from using information tied to a user or device to feed algorithmic recommendations to minors unless the operator has verified the user is not a minor, obtained verifiable parental consent, or fits within several narrow exceptions. Those exceptions include user-requested content, direct private communications, search results, privacy/accessibility settings, sequential content, and other limited circumstances.
The bill also imposes time-of-day limits on notifications to minors, requires default settings that restrict minors’ access to recommendation-based portions of platforms to one hour per day, and allows parents or guardians to further restrict notification windows, daily access time, and who can view or respond to a minor’s posts. Covered operators must publicly disclose certain annual data, including the number of covered users, the share with parental consent, the share subject to default settings, and average daily use by age and hour. Violations are treated as unfair or deceptive trade practices under Connecticut’s consumer protection law, and the act is effective July 1, 2026.
The bill adds a new section to the Connecticut General Statutes governing online platforms, especially social media services, and creates compliance obligations for operators that serve users in the state. It affects platform design, age-verification practices, parental consent workflows, notification systems, default account settings, and annual reporting. It also ties enforcement to the state’s unfair trade practices statute, giving the Attorney General a consumer-protection enforcement hook against noncompliant operators.
The available voting history suggests broad support for the bill. It received a unanimous 22-0 joint favorable substitute vote in committee and then passed the House 120-26 as amended. The title and structure indicate the bill reflects the Attorney General’s recommendations on social media and minors, and the strong vote totals suggest lawmakers generally viewed it as a child-safety and consumer-protection measure.
The main points of contention are likely the scope of platform regulation, the feasibility of age verification, and the balance between protecting minors and preserving access to online services. The bill requires operators to use commercially reasonable and technically feasible age-determination methods, but also limits how age-related data may be used and requires deletion after attempts to verify age or obtain consent. Another likely issue is the one-hour daily default limit and the mandated notification restrictions, which may be seen as intrusive or difficult to implement by platform operators. The bill also preserves operators’ ability to restrict obscene, violent, or otherwise objectionable content, which helps address free-speech concerns while still leaving room for debate over how broadly the law will be applied.