I’m all for educating kids (and honestly adults) about responsible internet use, digital permanence, online exploitation risks, privacy, and the very real repercussions that can come from online activity. That education is desperately needed, and far too many parents and schools are behind the curve on it.

Heck, call me. I started giving presentations on these issues more than 10 years ago and still happily will. I’m sure I could even enlist some of the best in Trust and Safety to help.

That said, as someone who has spent years working in internet law and platform-related legal issues, I’m not in favor of Arizona HB2991 in its current form.

To be clear, there are parts of the bill that I think come from a reasonable place. I don’t think platforms should be algorithmically promoting pornography or sexually exploitative material to minors through recommendations or targeted content feeds. I also think better parental tools, stronger reporting mechanisms, and safer default settings for minors are worthwhile conversations to have.

But legislation like this often sounds much simpler in theory than it is in practice.

The problem is that laws requiring broad age verification, parental consent systems, and platform monitoring create serious constitutional, privacy, and enforcement concerns. They also create a dangerous tradeoff: to “protect” minors, platforms are often pushed toward collecting even more identifying information from everyone through ID checks, data retention, and surveillance-style infrastructure tied to speech and internet access.

And realistically, technologically savvy minors (and those with the will to) will often bypass these systems anyway, while average users lose privacy in the process.

I also worry about vague or overly broad standards that put platforms in the position of deciding what content is “harmful,” especially when the law intersects with speech rights, education, health information, sexual orientation or gender identity topics, politics, or controversial social issues.

We absolutely should:

• teach digital literacy earlier
• educate parents (and grandparents)
• address predatory conduct aggressively
• prosecute exploitation crimes
• encourage healthier online habits

But I believe the better long-term path forward is education, awareness, and closing the digital knowledge gap between generations, parents, educators, policymakers, and the rapidly evolving technology itself.

Good intentions do not automatically make good internet law.