Linux may get a hall pass from one state age-check bill, but Congress plays hall monitor
- Reference: 1776880525
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2026/04/22/linux_us_state_age_verificaiton_laws/
- Source link:
Carl Richell, founder of Linux PC vendor System76, reports some encouraging news from the company’s home state of Colorado: the bill is still moving, but amended language appears likely to exclude FOSS OSes and some of the tools used to build and distribute them. He hopes to set a precedent in Colorado and then use it to persuade other state legislatures. The problem is that this may yet become somewhat moot, because the US Congress is getting interested as well, and national legislation may follow.
This story has been developing for some months now: we [1]first reported on this new legislation in early March, and the following week on [2]Richell's campaigning efforts . Later that month, we reported that [3]systemd had added code to store user ages .
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In that story, we also reported on the independent [5]TBOTE Project , which is investigating the funding of the lobbying efforts and the relatively new conservative pressure groups pressing for the laws, such as the [6]Digital Childhood Alliance (founded in 2025). TBOTE echoes [7]Bloomberg's reporting : Meta appears to be a major financial force behind recent age-verification lobbying.
[8]
[9]
On Tuesday, in a [10]Mastodon post , Richell reported:
I received the amended Colorado Age Attestation bill.
Open source OS's and apps are excluded
Code repos are excluded (github/gitlab)
Containers are excluded (docker/podman)
I testify Thursday and can use your help! I need your stories about incredible things kids have made thanks to access to open source software. Share here or DM me.
Richell, whose company is based in the Colorado state capital of Denver, added in a follow-up [11]comment :
With the way this worked out, I believe we now have a sound template to start working in other states. I haven't found the amended text online but will post as soon I do. Our next step is a letter to the CO reps that we need to pass the bill with these amendments, then adapting that letter to other states and working with the open source community to raise awareness.
So far, so good. As we reported in March, there are similar bills in Colorado, California, New York, Illinois, Louisiana, Texas, and Utah – as well as in the nation of Brazil.
Similar legislation has now been introduced at the federal level. The United States Congress is considering [12]H.R.8250 - Parents Decide Act : a bill that would require operating system providers to verify users' ages, require parental verification for minors, and support parental consent controls.
"H.R." here denotes the [13]House of Representatives , the lower house of the [14]US Congress ; the upper house is the [15]US Senate .
[16]
[17]OSNews notes an important difference in this bill:
If passed, the bill would require actual age verification , instead of mere voluntary age reporting that current state-level bills cover.
For any US readers who want to do something about it, one potential place to start is this [18]Reddit thread , which contains links for [19]how to find your representative and a template for a letter to send to them.
[20]US state laws push age checks into the operating system
[21]Age verification isn't sage verification when it's inside operating systems
[22]Age checks creep into Linux as systemd gets a DOB field
[23]Nanny state discovers Linux, demands it check kids' IDs before booting
It does seem to the Reg FOSS desk that the root cause here is the owners of online services not wanting to bear the responsibility for their users and the content that they post and read. If social networks were obliged to have robust age verification, and users were compelled to use their real names, real faces, and bear full legal responsibility for their actions, then there would be much less reason to try to pass the buck on to the vendors of the tools used to access those online services.
If the FOSS desk were running the show, we might start by repealing the Communications Decency Act of 1996, [24]Section 230 , which "provides limited federal immunity to providers and users of interactive computer services."
Of course, this might require verified names and validated ID everywhere, and armies of content moderators nearly as numerous as the users. It might even effectively put all the big social networks out of business.
But we're sure there might be some downsides as well. ®
Get our [25]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2026/03/06/os_age_verification/
[2] https://www.theregister.com/2026/03/10/foss_age_verification_2/
[3] https://www.theregister.com/2026/03/24/foss_age_verification/
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aelFA4udaw8Nou0yH29FZAAAAsY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[5] https://tboteproject.com/
[6] https://www.digitalchildhoodalliance.org
[7] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-07-25/meta-clashes-with-apple-google-over-child-age-check-legislation
[8] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aelFA4udaw8Nou0yH29FZAAAAsY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[9] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aelFA4udaw8Nou0yH29FZAAAAsY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[10] https://fosstodon.org/@carlrichell/116442974622287951
[11] https://fosstodon.org/@carlrichell/116443013398378629
[12] https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/8250/text
[13] https://www.house.gov/
[14] https://www.congress.gov/
[15] https://www.senate.gov/
[16] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aelFA4udaw8Nou0yH29FZAAAAsY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[17] https://www.osnews.com/story/144803/nationwide-bill-to-put-age-verification-in-operating-systems-introduced-in-the-us/
[18] https://www.reddit.com/r/cybersecurity/comments/1ssk0hn/hr_8250_parents_decide_act_would_require_age/
[19] https://www.house.gov/representatives/find-your-representative
[20] https://www.theregister.com/2026/03/06/os_age_verification/
[21] https://www.theregister.com/2026/03/16/opinon_column_age_verification/
[22] https://www.theregister.com/2026/03/24/foss_age_verification/
[23] https://www.theregister.com/2026/03/13/opinion_os_verification/
[24] https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R46751
[25] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: Land of the free!
And where owning a pre-age check OS beomes a federal offence.
after all, we can trust capitalist companies like micro$ to have the customer at heart.... right?
Re: Land of the free!
At least then people might wake up and see the true nature of the threat, and how far it's gone while they were busy bingewatching crap and cheering on $MEGASTAR and $SPORTS_TEAM.
Most are content to remain oblivious until they're already identified digital peons in a consumerized gulag. By then it's too late.
Age checks don't apply to non-US projects who tell nannies to pound sand
Unless your project leaders live in the US or bank in the US, you can just tell the fundamentalists to fuck off, and the rest of us can download and use free software.
Tor still works. VPNs still work. Anti-download activists have lost every single battle since before the days of Napster.
another reason to block linux
The whole idea should be shot down. Those hosting content where age restrictions exist should be bearing the cost. Just exempting open source from the offloaded requirement, could be another reason to ignore anything but windows, mac, android, or iphone. It smacks of made for IE all over again.
Re: another reason to block linux
Those having children should be supervising their children, not forcing the rest of us to live in a world made for kids.
Re: another reason to block linux
> Those having children should be supervising their children, not forcing the rest of us to live in a world made for kids.
The real problem is not parents allegedly not supervising their children.
The problem is adults that want to supervise other adults under the pretext of supervising other person's children.
Re: another reason to block linux
Outsourcing causing trouble for everyone else yet again, in this case though, it's parenting.
Exemptions today, amendments tomorrow.
Amazon pushed to have internet sales taxed at P.O.S. because Amazon had AWS software that could determine tax nation wide. I've never seen that talked about but the lobbying made it obvious what Amazon was doing.
Facebook, Google, Amazon and all the rest are pushing age verification because it's the 1 thing that "agentic" AI can do right now and companies would require a ridiculous amount of "agents".
Investors want a silver bullet app for AI, so here's identity verification nationwide, for everything, all the time.
End of privacy
"If social networks were obliged to have robust age verification, and users were compelled to use their real names, real faces, and bear full legal responsibility for their actions, then there would be much less reason to try to pass the buck on to the vendors of the tools used to access those online services."
If age verification had been in place when I was growing up with access to the internet, I'd never have been able to to communicate with a great many people who have since become long-term friends, nor explore a broad swath of more niche interests (console homebrew, programming) because I wouldn't have been able to ask the questions that helped me along.
Parents would not have done it on my behalf (I was told off for having an email that wasn't Hotmail - that was the only one they knew, other than Yahoo) because we were always taught to give as little info as possible online. That means using pseudonyms, emails that aren't forename.surname69@domain.tld, and so on. I would certainly not have been allowed to get Linux, given the " l33t hacker" image it used to foster.
In effect my current knowledge of computing and many other topics would have been severely stunted, and many friendships never able to be made. I will use fake details whenever possible, and this kind of thinking would simply shut me out of the modern internet entirely. I've no interest in Facebook, Twitter and the like, but think of all the StackOverflows, Githubs, even Runescapes with guild forums, that would never have been able to be accessed without giving away huge amounts of personal info. Age verification locks out access not just to children but to anyone who values their privacy. Many still disagree given the modern internet, but I will never stop pushing back against it.
Can always relocate to Finland
Better for everybody, especially the EU.
They'll probably ban age checks at OS level anyway, as they are more likely to understand multiple user accounts than the Amurrican Pruzzidunce.
Age check crap is still stupid.
Not only Linux, for Windows PRO and SERVER as well. I mean, a company uses that OS, and WTF age check built into the Windows pro on the laptops before they can start to work? Just the idea itself is bonkers.
Land of the free!
LOL!
We can only speculate what the elites have in store for us considering they're fighting tooth and nail to construct an impregnable digital prison where even desktop linux users (<5% market share) cannot be allowed to escape biometric tracking.