A bipartisan bill just introduced would build an age check into the operating system of every phone and computer sold in America.
The Digital Age Assurance Act of 2026, S. 5090, from Senators Andy Kim, Cynthia Lummis, Adam Schiff, and John Barrasso, takes California’s age-signaling law and makes it the national standard.
The bill was referred to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation on July 22, 2026, and would take effect 18 months after enactment.
We finally obtained a copy of the bill text for you here.
With the proposals, an operating system cannot be used without an account, and the account requires the user to “indicate the date of birth and age of the user.”
For now, the user gets to declare their own age. A “covered device” is any computer, mobile device or other general-purpose computing device capable of running an operating system, so the requirement reaches practically everything.
This is also backdated and accounts that already exist when the law takes effect are included.
The operating provider may skip the prompt where it already knows the age of the user from some other obligation, including a purchase authorization.
When a declaration is made into one of four brackets, under 13, 13 to 15, 16, or 17+. The system broadcasts only the bracket, which the bill defines as “non-personally identifiable data derived from a user’s date of birth or age.”
Apps, app stores, and even browsers would have to have the ability to request that bracket and use it as “the primary indicator of a user’s age.”
Some websites would be included in this too. A “covered internet website” is one already “required under Federal or State law to verify the age of a user,” so the website obligations attach only where a state or federal age-verification mandate already exists.
With the first use of the browser on a device, it would request a signal from the operating system, and then it hands that signal to covered website operators on request. But the bill does not say how.
Under the proposals, a “browser provider” is anyone who “owns, maintains, or controls a browser for use on a covered device.” No size threshold is attached. A small maintainer with a few thousand users would carry the same obligation as a big tech platform like Google.
Anyone under 17, which is the bill’s definition of a “child,” has to “link their account to the account of a parent or legal guardian.” The only exception is for emancipated minors. There’s no trusted adult option that can override this. A 16-year-old in an abusive household, or one researching a parent’s conduct, has no route that does not run through the person they need distance from.
Hellbound and Down 