Parental-consent apps are simple solution

As a community advocate and the president of the Dennis De La Rosa Scholarship, I see the transformative power of mentorship in young lives across Chicago every day. But even as we create safe spaces in our neighborhoods, we watch our youth navigate a dangerous digital playground. While state legislatures across the country have scrambled to enact online safety laws, these well-intentioned but piecemeal approaches have stalled in the courts and left our children vulnerable. There’s a simpler, more effective solution staring us in the face: requiring parental consent at the app-store level.

States are racing to implement various protective measures — from age verification requirements to platform-specific restrictions for teens. Despite good aims, these fragmented approaches create a confusing maze of regulations, leaving families to navigate complex and often contradictory rules as they navigate parenting online.

The solution lies not in a state-by-state approach but in a unified federal standard centered on app-store parental consent. App store parental consent would create a single point of oversight where parents can verify their teens’ age and then approve app downloads. The broad public support for such measures is clear — 79% of parents favor requiring parental approval for teens under 16 to download apps.

The mechanics of app-store parental consent are simple: it builds on systems app users already know and trust — the Apple App Store and Google Play. When a teen wants to download a social media app, parents receive an immediate notification through their app store account.

Congress has a clear opportunity to cut through this red tape of state-by-state regulations with this common-sense solution. Federal app-store parental consent offers a single, unified approach that works across all platforms and jurisdictions. Let’s move beyond the patchwork of state laws and implement a system that truly works for families across America.

Gustavo De La Rosa, President

Dennis De La Rosa Scholarship

Chicago