Texas app store age verification law blocked by federal judge

Constitutional Rights & Age Limits

• Many argue the law violates the First Amendment because it conditions access to all apps (i.e., all kinds of speech) on ID checks, analogous to forcing bookstores to card every customer.
• Others push back that many rights are already age-limited in practice (guns, voting, alcohol), and seek a consistent legal principle; responses note minors do have meaningful 1A protections and that broad age-gating fails strict scrutiny.
• Several comments reference established doctrine: limits on fundamental rights must serve a “compelling interest,” be narrowly tailored, and use the least restrictive means. Broad app-store gates are seen as failing all three.

Privacy, Surveillance & the Fourth Amendment

• Strong concern that mandatory ID verification expands surveillance: more sensitive data, more centralization, more potential abuse by governments and corporations.
• Some argue the Fourth Amendment already protects privacy “on paper,” but courts and doctrines like the third-party doctrine have eroded that protection in practice, especially with data held by tech companies.
• Examples are cited where police access to search histories or cloud data occurs without warrants, reinforcing mistrust.

Analogy Debates: Books, Porn, Movies, Internet

• Disagreement over the judge’s bookstore analogy: critics say app stores are gateways to dynamic social environments, unlike static books.
• Others respond that children have 1A rights and internet-delivered speech is still speech; analogy is meant to illustrate overbreadth, not literal equivalence.
• Narrow porn laws are contrasted with broad app-store mandates: porn is a specific content category; “apps” or “the internet” are too general to target constitutionally.

Technical & Practical Issues

• Developers describe age-verification APIs as brittle, privacy-hostile, and effectively unworkable at scale; failures would either block legitimate users or force apps to “fail open.”
• Discussion of token-based or liquor-store-style age checks shows deep skepticism: implementation details could still deanonymize users and create chilling effects.

Broader Legal & Global Context

• Some commenters in the EU/UK express envy at U.S. constitutional protections as their own governments expand online speech and age-control regimes.
• Others note that legal complexity and judicial interpretation effectively determine how rights are experienced in practice, regardless of constitutional text.