Age verification bill for adult websites passes committee of SD lawmakers • South Dakota Searchlight

PIERRE — A committee of South Dakota lawmakers endorsed a bill Friday that would require pornographic websites to implement age verification measures. 

The House State Affairs Committee passed the measure 11-2, with all yes votes from Republicans and the two no votes from Democrats. It now goes to the full House of Representatives. 

The legislation would require pornographic websites to ensure users are at least 18 years old by verifying their identification, via means that could include submitting an image of an identification card. The bill would also prohibit the websites and any third parties conducting age verification from retaining users’ identifying information post-verification. 

Non-compliance by websites would result in a misdemeanor for the first offense and escalate to a felony for subsequent violations. The bill contains lengthy definitions for pornographic content harmful to children.

Rep. Bethany Soye, R-Sioux Falls, is the prime sponsor of the bill. She said it’s essential to protect minors from exposure to explicit online content.

Hollie Strand is a forensic examiner with the Pennington County Sheriff’s Office who said she was testifying on her own behalf. She said children as young as kindergarten students are being exposed to pornography, whether parents take measures to protect their kids or not.

“I had a kindergartener ask me what to do when his friend showed him porn and he asked him to stop,” she said. 

The state Attorney General’s Office endorsed the bill. 

The American Civil Liberties Union of South Dakota testified in opposition and said that while the intention is to safeguard minors, the legislation could undermine the First Amendment rights of adults who might be deterred by age-verification privacy concerns from accessing legal content.

“Allowing the government to restrict access to sexual content will inevitably lead to more censorship and a more restricted internet for everyone,” said Samantha Chapman, ACLU of South Dakota advocacy manager. “Young people deserve our protection and support, but age-gating the internet is not the answer.”

The legislative effort follows similar, failed legislation from last year. 

In response, an interim study committee was established to examine the issue further. A separate, similar bill also addresses the issue this session in the Senate but hasn’t had a hearing yet.

Sen. David Wheeler, R-Huron, a sponsor of the Senate bill, said it’s modeled after Texas legislation that’s under consideration by the U.S. Supreme Court. The bill would only take effect if the Texas law is upheld. Wheeler said that would prevent South Dakota from having to face litigation and pay legal fees for its own law.

The other difference is the Senate bill would only require age verification for sites where at least one-third of the content is harmful to minors, to more clearly distinguish between pornographic sites and sites that merely contain some adult content. In response to a South Dakota Searchlight question, Wheeler acknowledged that pornographic sites could transition two-thirds of their content to non-harmful material to avoid being age-gated.

“That just illustrates the difficulty of regulating this stuff,” Wheeler said.