Advanced out of committee; no floor vote
Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA)
25%of the way to law
Bad for your rightsIn progress
- Introduced
- Passed House
- Passed Senate
- Became Law
Reported by committee; Sen. Rand Paul blocked a unanimous-consent vote September 30, 2026
The Senate bill would require platforms to use “reasonable care” in designing their features to prevent a list of harms to minors, a duty that pushes them to check the age of every user; the House passed a different, narrower version.
Latest update
Sen. Rand Paul blocked an attempt to pass KOSA by unanimous consent; the Senate then adjourned until November (The Hill)
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Read S.1748S.1748 official recordRead H.R.6484H.R.6484 official recordKey facts
- Where
- United States
- Bill number
- S.1748 / H.R.6484 (119th)
- Status
- In progress
- Introduced
- S.1748: May 14, 2025
H.R.6484: December 5, 2025 - Threat
- High
- Last update
- September 30, 2026
Topics
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What it does
The Senate's KOSA (S.1748, Sens. Blackburn and Blumenthal) requires platforms to “exercise reasonable care” in designing their features to prevent and mitigate a list of harms to minors, a duty of care enforced by the FTC (state attorneys general can enforce other sections), and orders a federal study of age verification built into devices and operating systems. The House version (H.R.6484, Rep. Gus Bilirakis) is a different bill: it drops the duty of care, keeps only a general requirement for policies against a shorter list of harms, applies its safeguards only to users a platform knows are minors, and as introduced would bar any state law that “relates to” it. The House passed its KOSA inside the KIDS Act on June 29, 2026, with a clause stating that nothing in it requires age verification and with preemption narrowed to state laws that directly conflict.
What’s at stake
A duty of care toward minors can only be met by knowing which users are minors, so the Senate version pushes platforms toward age checks on everyone, and its device-level study points at age verification built into every phone and computer. The House version applies only where a platform already knows a user is a minor, but it travels in a package whose SCREEN Act title mandates age checks on adult sites.
Our take
The Senate version is the one that drives ID checks: a duty of care toward minors cannot be met without sorting everyone, and the bill already asks how to build age verification into the operating system. The House stripped that duty out and said in the text that it requires no age verification. Sen. Rand Paul blocked a fast-track vote on September 30, so KOSA waits until after the November election.
Timeline
Sen. Rand Paul blocked an attempt to pass KOSA by unanimous consent; the Senate then adjourned until November (The Hill)Latest
Reported by committee
The House passed its KOSA as part of the KIDS Act (H.R. 7757)
House Commerce, Manufacturing, and Trade Subcommittee advanced the House version 13-10 as an amended substitute
House version introduced by Rep. Gus Bilirakis (H.R. 6484), without the Senate bill's duty of care
Introduced
Referred to committee
The record
Sponsor
Marsha Blackburn (R-TN)
Cosponsors (76)
Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), John Thune (R-SD), Charles Schumer (D-NY), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), John Hickenlooper (D-CO), Mark Kelly (D-AZ)
Committee
Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee
Previous versions
Passed the Senate 91-3; stalled in the House
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