If you're tired of censorship and dystopian threats against civil liberties, subscribe to Reclaim The Net. A push is underway to get the US House of Representatives to pass the controversial Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA), before the mandate of the current Congress expires in early January. To this end, Senator Marsha Blackburn – a Republican who, along with Democrat Senator Richard Blumenthal led the charge to get the bill adopted in the Senate in July – has penned an opinion piece almost entirely crafted as yet another “think of the children” talking point. Buried in the article – meant to demonstrate the urgent need of adopting KOSA by linking minors’ online presence with anything from anxiety and depression to cognitive decline, sex trafficking, and death by overdose – is the mention of one of the key criticisms of the bill, namely, that it will bring in even more censorship. Blackburn acknowledges this is the concern that has kept KOSA “stalled for months” in the House, but then quickly dismisses the reasons as “blatant falsehoods” spread by Big Tech lobbyists. Equally quickly the senator reveals that the bill that the Senate passed has been “updated” in order to dispel those same censorship concerns. The gist of these changes appears to be to make the bill less overbroad and vague – which is how censorship of protected speech could creep into its implementation if it becomes law. Hardly a “Big Tech” lobbyist, the digital rights group EFF in September warned that mitigating online harms is something that needs to be done, but without violating the First Amendment. The version of KOSA that was in the House at the time, the group said, represented “an unconstitutional censorship bill that gives the FTC, and potentially state Attorneys General, the power to restrict protected online speech they find objectionable.” The second major objection to KOSA is something Blackburn didn’t touch on in her opinion piece: age verification. In order for platforms to comply and restrict minors from accessing certain content, they would have to be able to ascertain a user’s age. The only reliable way to do that would be to ID everyone on the internet, by forcing them to upload personal data, proof of government-issued identity documents. And that would create a whole new world of “online harms” – concerning both data safety, but also government overreach beyond censorship, and potentially into new forms of mass surveillance. If you're tired of censorship and dystopian threats against civil liberties, subscribe to Reclaim The Net. The post Senators Rush to Pass Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA), Face Criticism Over Censorship and Age Verification Issues appeared first on Reclaim The Net.