Georgia can limit minors’ social media accounts, judges say
Georgia can enforce its new law requiring social media platforms to verify the age of account holders and restrict use by minors, a panel of federal appellate judges has ruled, lifting a temporary ban on the law’s implementation.
The ruling Thursday by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, which has jurisdiction over Georgia, Florida and Alabama, struck a blow to NetChoice, a trade organization for internet companies including Meta, Amazon, Google and Netflix.
NetChoice sued Georgia’s attorney general in May 2025, two months before the Protecting Georgia’s Children on Social Media Act was to go into effect. The trade organization claimed the law, Senate Bill 351, chills the rights of all Georgians to engage in anonymous speech online, contrary to the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
The state law aims to prevent children under the age of 16 from having social media accounts without a parent or guardian’s permission. It also limits advertising on, and the collection of information from, minors’ social media accounts.
“This is a major win for Georgia families and a huge blow to those who would stand in the way of commonsense solutions to protect our kids,” Attorney General Chris Carr said in a statement Thursday. “We have said before — it shouldn’t take lawsuits, investigations or legislation to do the right thing. This is about keeping our children safe from online predators and mental health harms. Nothing is more important.”
A spokesperson for NetChoice did not immediately respond Thursday to questions about the case.
A federal judge in Atlanta sided with NetChoice in June 2025 and temporarily blocked the state from enforcing the challenged aspects of the law while the case is litigated. The state was allowed to implement unchallenged parts of the law, including a requirement for schools to prevent students from accessing pornographic websites.
The decision to hamstring Georgia’s enforcement of its law was wrong, 11th Circuit judges Kevin Newsom, Robert Luck and Gerald Bard Tjoflat said Thursday, adding that NetChoice is unlikely to win its case.
“We hold that NetChoice … has failed to demonstrate a likelihood of success on the merits of its claims,” the judges said in a published opinion. “It has not carried the burden that accompanies its decision to mount a facial First Amendment challenge, nor has it shown that SB 351 is unconstitutionally vague or preempted by (federal law).”
The case now returns to U.S. District Judge Amy Totenberg in Atlanta.
In her ruling last June, Totenberg said she “takes seriously the acute harm that social media may potentially cause young people.” But she said the core principles of the First Amendment are “a vital shield protective of the constitutional rights of both adults and youth.”
The 11th Circuit judges said Thursday that SB 351 imposes liability on social media platforms for their own decisions, not the speech of others.
The law imposes fines on companies that fail to make reasonable efforts to confirm users are 16 or older, among other things.