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Technology companies are identifying the first popular social media platforms covered under Florida's new law banning such services for young teens: Snapchat and YouTube. The acknowledgement came in the latest federal court filings as part of a renewed legal fight challenging whether the restrictions are constitutional.The court records said Facebook and Instagram might also be covered because they “appear to satisfy each of the criteria” under the new law. The companies cited references to Instagram and Facebook by Republican lawmakers who identified which social media companies they were targeting with the bill during its passage last year.
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Facing potential First Amendment challenges, Florida has proposed details about how it will carry out a new law aimed at keeping children off social-media platforms and blocking minors from accessing online pornography.Attorney General Ashley Moody’s office on Tuesday published three proposed rules that include addressing one of the most closely watched issues in the law: age verification.
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Facebook, Messenger and Instagram were apparently offline Tuesday morning in a massive social media outage.News media around the world were reporting the outage with stories of users accounts suddenly going offline and attempts to reconnect thwarted.The service returned shortly after noon.
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Florida’s Republican-led Senate passed a sweeping bill Thursday in Tallahassee that would ban all kids under 16 from using social media – even with a parent’s permission – and would require everyone else in the Sunshine State to prove they are adults to continue using their online accounts.Within hours, Gov. Ron DeSantis resurfaced his own objections over banning high school students who are 14 or 15 and whose parents might want to give their children access. “Parents need to have a role in this,” he said at a news conference. He added, “We can’t say 100% of the uses are bad.”
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The Lee County Sheriff’s Office removed the ability to comment on some social media posts last year, something that's well within their right to do, but prompting some to wonder why.Instagram comments ceased on July 28 of last year, but it’s unknown when the same occurred on Facebook. Law enforcement and citizen perspectives varied on the lack of comment availability on the Sheriff's Office's social media sites.
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Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody on Tuesday filed a federal lawsuit alleging the parent company of Facebook and Instagram uses "manipulative" features to keep minors hooked on the social-media platforms.