Jesse Scheckner
Legislation to better safeguard kids online while giving parents and police more tools to fight and catch pedophiles just cleared its last committee stop in the House after undergoing some notable changes.
The House Commerce Committee voted unanimously for HB 743, the Legislature’s latest proposal aimed at tamping down on web-based predation of Florida youths.
Escambia County Republican Rep. Michelle Salzman, one of the measure’s sponsors, said the “responsible, narrowly crafted” changes it proposes will help curb “one of the most heinous crimes imaginable.”
“We owe it to these children and to the families shattered by the crimes,” she said. “Let’s give law enforcement and prosecutors every possible chance to hold traffickers accountable.”
Salzman amended her bill Tuesday to change its scope. Rather than require social media platforms to give law enforcement blanket access to a minor’s account after receiving a warrant or parental consent, the companies would have to disclose “any technically feasible and reasonably available data” to a police officer if given a court order, subpoena or search warrant.
The amended bill also removed a requirement that social media platforms allow parents and legal guardians to view their 14- and 15-year-olds’ online messages. Instead, under the strike-all language, platforms would need only to allow parents and legal guardians to view a list of the account names with which their child exchanged messages.
Social media platforms would also have to delete all personal information for any account, regardless of the account holder’s age, within 45 days of its termination by the user unless there are legal requirements to maintain the data.
One provision that carried over unchanged from the bill’s prior iteration would prohibit social media companies from allowing users under 14 to access messages designed to disappear or self-destruct after a certain time period, like those on Snapchat and Instagram.
HB 743 differs from its upper-chamber companion (SB 868) by Spring Hill Republican Sen. Blaise Ingoglia, which targets end-to-end encryption that many platforms use to protect their systems and users from privacy breaches. Both bills pend floor votes after clearing their respective committee assignments.
ACLU Florida and TechNet, a technology advocacy group, signaled opposition to HB 743. Florida Family Voice and Florida Prosecuting Attorneys signaled support.
State Attorney Jack Campbell of the 2nd Judicial Circuit said the bill is a necessary step toward protecting kids where predators hunt them today.
“People who are looking for children don’t go to playgrounds anymore; they go to chatrooms,” he said. “Unfortunately, while the internet has been an extraordinarily powerful tool, that tool like many tools can be used for great evil, and due to greater levels of encryption, greater sophistication in social media, that is where pedophiles are meeting their victims. And this is where the evidence is.”
Merritt Island Republican Rep. Tyler Sirois, HB 743’s other sponsor, noted that despite the bill’s intended effects, no one representing a social media company attended the meeting to speak for or against it.
“They could have filled out a speaker card and offered some constructive feedback in terms of what they’re going to do proactively in order to protect our kids online,” he said. “I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, everything I’ve seen from them (shows) they don’t give a damn about our kids. We all need to be paying more attention to that.”
HB 743 adds to legislation (HB 3) state lawmakers passed in 2024 limiting minors’ access to social media platforms, including prohibiting kids 13 and younger from opening and maintaining accounts and requiring parental consent for 14- and 15-year-olds to do so.
That restriction is now being challenged in court.
The federal Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, which has been in effect since April 2000, requires social media companies to get verifiable parental consent before collecting personal information about their children, though few believe it’s been effectively enforced.
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, 1 in 5 children per year receive unwanted sexual solicitation online. One in 33 are targets of aggressive sexual solicitation, which involves pushes by the culprit to make offline contact. And at any given time, some 50,000 predators are on the internet actively seeking out children.
