By Maria Dinzeo ( September 1, 2026, 23:34 GMT | Comment) -- California’s child online-safety push is entering a more mature phase, as lawmakers use lessons from years of litigation and earlier legislation to tighten age-assurance rules, revive privacy protections, regulate addictive design features and raise the stakes for platforms accused of harming children.California lawmakers have spent years trying to rein in social media companies through legislation targeting individual pieces of the online-safety problem. In 2022, the focus was children’s data, with the Age-Appropriate Design Code. Two years later, lawmakers took aim at social media addiction with the Protecting Our Kids from Social Media Addiction Act. And last year, age verification moved to the forefront with the Digital Age Assurance Act, requiring operating systems and app stores to generate and transmit users’ age brackets to app developers....
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