Current status (as of August 2026): S. 1748 was read twice and referred to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation on May 14, 2025. On August 5, 2026, the committee acted on it. Its latest recorded action reads, verbatim: "Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation. Ordered to be reported with an amendment in the nature of a substitute favorably." It has not become law. The substitute text is not published: Congress.gov lists exactly one text version of S. 1748, the text introduced on May 14, 2025, so what the committee approved cannot be read, and this page does not describe it.

S. 1748, the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA), is a Senate bill that would require online platforms likely to be used by people under 17 — including social media services, video games, messaging apps, and video streaming services — to take steps to prevent and mitigate specified harms to minors, and to provide safeguards and parental tools. It was introduced by Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) on May 14, 2025, with 76 cosponsors from both parties. This page tracks where the bill stands and is written from the introduced text, the only version Congress.gov publishes. LegislationPatch's full section-by-section analysis of the bill is at S. 1748, Kids Online Safety Act.

Where S. 1748 Stands

The bill sits in the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, and Congress.gov files it under the policy area Science, Technology, Communications. It has drawn broad cosponsorship: 76 senators, comprising 42 Republicans, 33 Democrats, and 1 independent, in addition to the sponsor. Three of those cosponsors signed on the day of introduction — Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Sen. John Thune (R-SD), and Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-NY). Thune is the Senate Majority Leader and Schumer is the Democratic Leader, so both party leaders are original cosponsors. Sen. Blackburn and Sen. Blumenthal have been the bill's principal authors across multiple Congresses.

S. 1748's full action history runs to three entries, and being ordered reported is the first of three steps the predecessor bill records. In the 118th Congress, S. 1409 was "Ordered to be reported with an amendment in the nature of a substitute favorably" on July 27, 2023, then separately "Reported by Senator Cantwell with an amendment in the nature of a substitute. Without written report." and "Placed on Senate Legislative Calendar under General Orders. Calendar No. 287." on December 13, 2023. Congress.gov records neither of those two later steps for S. 1748.

The House, meanwhile, has moved a different measure. On June 29, 2026, it passed H.R. 7757, the Kids Internet and Digital Safety (KIDS) Act, sponsored by Rep. Brett Guthrie (R-KY), under suspension of the rules by a vote of 267–117; the bill was received in the Senate on July 13, 2026, and referred to the same Commerce Committee where S. 1748 sits. The two bills are not linked as companions in Congress.gov's related-bill record, which lists no related bills for S. 1748. The House bill does not carry KOSA's duty of care — its section 213(c) provides that nothing in its harms provision may be construed to "impose a duty of care on a provider of a covered platform," and its own obligation is to "establish, implement, maintain, and enforce reasonable policies, practices, and procedures" addressing four listed harms, against the seven in S. 1748.

How KOSA Got Here

KOSA has been introduced in successive Congresses. In the 118th Congress (2023–2024), the version numbered S. 1409 — sponsored that Congress by Sen. Blumenthal — was reported by the Commerce Committee and placed on the Senate calendar in December 2023, but it did not receive a standalone floor vote.

Instead, on July 30, 2024 the Senate acted on a combined measure that Congress.gov now displays under the title Kids Online Safety and Privacy Act. Procedurally, the Senate carried it on an unrelated legislative vehicle: S. 2073 had been introduced as the Eliminate Useless Reports Act of 2023, "A bill to amend title 31, United States Code, to require agencies to include a list of outdated or duplicative reporting requirements in annual budget justifications, and for other purposes." All three Congressional Research Service summaries Congress.gov holds for S. 2073 describe that reporting bill; none describes the measure the Senate ultimately passed. The recorded action was that the "Senate concurred in the House amendment to S. 2073 with an amendment (SA 3021) by Yea-Nay Vote. 91 - 3. Record Vote Number: 221." Five days earlier, cloture on that motion was invoked 86–1 on Record Vote 219, whose roll call records "Required For Majority: 3/5." S. 2073's last recorded action is "Message on Senate action sent to the House." on July 31, 2024; the House did not take the package up before the 118th Congress ended, so the measure expired and had to be reintroduced. S. 1748 is the 119th Congress reintroduction.

What the Bill Would Require

According to the Congressional Research Service summary published on Congress.gov, S. 1748 would, among other things:

  • Impose a duty of care. Covered platforms would be required to exercise reasonable care in the design and use of features that increase minors' online activity, in order to prevent and mitigate harm to minors such as mental health disorders and severe harassment.
  • Require safeguards for minors. Platforms would have to provide protections for minors' data, tools for parents (such as access to minors' privacy settings), and a mechanism for account holders and visitors to report harm to minors.
  • Limit research on children. Platforms would be prohibited from conducting market or product research on children under 13, and could conduct such research on those under 17 only with parental consent.
  • Add algorithm transparency and an opt-out. Platforms using algorithms that prioritize information based on user-specific data not provided for that purpose would have to notify users and permit them to switch to an algorithm that does not rely on that data.
  • Provide for enforcement. The bill provides for enforcement through the Federal Trade Commission and states.

What Happens Next

With the committee having ordered the bill reported, the remaining committee steps are the formal report and placement on the Senate Legislative Calendar, after which the bill could be scheduled for floor consideration. Reaching a final vote in the Senate generally requires clearing a 60-vote cloture threshold; the roll call on the 2024 predecessor package records that threshold as "Required For Majority: 3/5," and cloture was agreed to 86–1. A bill that passed the Senate would then need to pass the House — the step that did not happen in the previous Congress — and be signed by the President.

Who Supports KOSA, Who Opposes It, and Why

No recorded vote has tested S. 1748 in the 119th Congress: its three-entry action history carries no roll call. The positions below are the strongest on-record case each side has published — in sponsor statements and organizational analyses — rather than positions settled by a vote.

Why do supporters back KOSA?

S. 1748 was introduced by Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) with Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), and its three original cosponsors include both party leaders, Sen. John Thune (R-SD) and Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-NY). Supporters argue that a duty of care would require large platforms to design their services to prevent and mitigate specific harms to minors — the bill lists seven, among them eating disorders, substance use disorders and suicidal behaviors, sexual exploitation and abuse of minors, and financial harms — rather than leaving those design choices unaccountable.

After the House passed the KIDS Act on June 29, 2026, Blackburn and Blumenthal argued in a joint statement that the House measure is "a pale imitation of Big Tech accountability," and that removing the duty of care "will only maintain the status quo in which Big Tech uses our kids as profit centers and leaves parents to pick up the pieces." They said they "will not back down from the fight to pass the stronger, more widely supported version of the Kids Online Safety Act," and that they "will not greenlight hollow reforms" that would leave what they called Big Tech's "predatory business model" intact.

Organizational support for KOSA is on the record chiefly from the previous Congress. The American Psychological Association says that in 2023, after a June advocacy summit, "APA Services led a coalition of more than 200 organizations" that sent a letter to Senate leaders "asking for swift passage of KOSA" — a letter directed at the version then before the Senate, not at S. 1748. The APA says that bill "aims to curb the harms associated with social media use" and describes its first goal as to "place responsibility on social media companies to prevent and mitigate harms to minors resulting from use of their platforms." It lists five goals in all; two of the others are to "require companies to develop and deploy new parental controls that provide education and options to parents and children to further identify and report harmful behaviors on social media" and to "require social media companies to conduct and distribute an annual independent audit that demonstrates the risks to minors on their platform, along with compliance with the comprehensive Kids Online Safety Act." The APA says the Senate Commerce Committee passed that bill on a unanimous vote.

Supporters argue that platforms will not adopt such measures on their own, and that the bill answers the objections in its own text. Section 102(b)(1) provides that nothing in the duty of care requires a platform to prevent a minor from "deliberately and independently searching for, or specifically requesting, content," and section 102(b)(2) bars a government entity from enforcing the duty "based upon the viewpoint of users expressed by or through any speech, expression, or information protected by the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States." On the age-verification objection specifically, section 112(c) provides that nothing in the title shall be construed to require "a covered platform to implement an age gating or age verification functionality."

Why do opponents object?

The Electronic Frontier Foundation argues that the reintroduced bill "will make the internet worse for everyone." In a May 15, 2025 analysis of S. 1748 itself, the EFF argues that because a platform cannot know in advance whether "an attorney general or FTC lawyer" might later decide hosted content was harmful, "To avoid liability, platforms will over-censor." It argues that the consequence is predictable: "When the safest legal option is to delete a forum, platforms will delete the forum." The EFF also argues that the standard rests on a term with no settled meaning, saying there is no accepted clinical definition of compulsive usage of online services and calling the term "legislative sleight-of-hand: an undefined concept given legal teeth, with major consequences for speech and access to information." It argues the burden would fall unevenly: "Under KOSA, a small platform hosting mental health discussion boards will be just as vulnerable as Meta or TikTok—but much less able to defend itself."

The EFF argues that the bill's carve-outs do not resolve that problem, contending that "the text of the bill itself preferences certain viewpoints over others" and that "liability in KOSA attaches to the platform, not the user." On that reading, it argues, "The legal incentives guarantee that platforms will silence even remotely controversial speech to stay safe."

Writing in February 2024 about the version then pending, the EFF argued that no case law defines what reasonable care means in this context, and that "the legal requirements of KOSA are still only possible for sites to safely follow if they restrict access to content based on age, effectively mandating age verification."

The American Civil Liberties Union argues that KOSA would violate the First Amendment. Jenna Leventoff, senior policy counsel at the ACLU, said: "The overbroad language in KOSA and similar legislation risks censoring everything from jokes and hyperbole to useful information about sex ed and suicide prevention." The ACLU argues that "Although the House and Senate versions of this bill differ, at their core, both require apps and websites to prevent harm to minors," and that "the requirements will likely cause apps and websites to verify the ages of their users or remove a wide array of content from their platforms."

The Center for Democracy & Technology wrote to the Senate Commerce Committee on August 4, 2026, the day before the markup, about three of the bills before it — KOSA, the CHATBOT Act and the SCREEN Act. It opens by saying it "commends the Senate Commerce Committee for its focus on protecting children online" and that the committee "is right to focus on this critical topic," then says the three "fall short of their intended goals," "raise significant constitutional concerns," and that "Legislation that can never take effect protects no one." On KOSA specifically it argues that "The duty of care is likely unconstitutional," that "The bill incentivizes age verification, which endangers privacy and free expression for everyone," and that "kids in the LGBTQ community, disability community, and other marginalized groups will be disproportionately harmed by the censorship the bill would encourage."

The letter also says what it wants the committee to do instead: "Before advancing any of these bills further in the legislative process, the Committee should revise them to address these concerns." It says of a fourth measure that "S. 4199, The Youth AI Privacy Act takes a more appropriate approach," and that its safeguards for the use of minors’ data by generative AI services are "important safeguards that CDT supports." Writing the same day, Kate Ruane, director of CDT’s Free Expression Project, says the three bills "raise serious privacy, free expression, and constitutional concerns" and that "Legislation that is struck down in court or cannot be implemented effectively will not make children safer."

Fight for the Future, which describes itself as "a digital rights organization that has been leading coalitions of human rights, LGBTQ, reproductive rights, and digital rights organizations opposed to the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA)," argues that the duty of care "enforced by a Trump FTC would be a censorship and surveillance nightmare, especially for LGBTQ+ youth." On the day of the committee vote, Sarah Philips, campaign director at the organization, said: "Congress is once again doing political theater instead of actually meaningfully regulating the business model of Big Tech companies." The organization also argues that the two chambers are not converging, saying "The Senate version passed out of committee today is a completely different bill than what was passed in the House earlier this year."

How the bill has changed in response

The bill's evolution is itself on the record. Writing about the version revised in February 2024, the EFF said that revision removed the authority of state attorneys general to sue or prosecute people for not complying with the duty of care, and added a definition of the design features platforms must limit for minors. It argued at the same time that "those improvements do not cure" the bill's "core First Amendment problems," and that "state attorneys general still have a great deal of power to target online services and speech they do not like." Both changes carry into S. 1748: the duty of care in section 102(a) turns on the "creation and implementation of any design feature," and section 109(b) lets a state attorney general bring a civil action only over a violation of "section 103, 104, or 105" — not the duty of care itself, which is left to the Federal Trade Commission.

What the committee approved on August 5, 2026 is not public, so no side's argument about the current Senate text can be reported here. Fight for the Future, describing the same action, said "On August 5th, the Senate Commerce Committee passed the Kids Online Safety Act out of committee with zero debate." The most recent recorded vote in this policy area remains the House's 267–117 passage of H.R. 7757 on June 29, 2026, a measure that expressly disclaims imposing a duty of care.

Primary Sources

Drafted from primary source documents by LegislationPatch's automated research pipeline, then reviewed, verified, and edited by , Editor. Every figure and citation is checked against the official text before publication. See our editorial standards and AI disclosure.