Congress expands child privacy rules, restricts data broker sales to minors
H.R. 7757 — KIDS Act · Filed by Brett Guthrie (R-KY) · 1 cosponsor · Introduced Mar 3, 2026 · Passed chamber
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What it does
The KIDS Act creates a comprehensive federal framework to protect children and teens online. It establishes new rules for how websites and apps can collect and use data from minors under 18, requires educational campaigns about internet safety, creates a federal Kids Internet Safety Partnership to develop best practices, strengthens the existing COPPA law to cover teens and mobile apps, and creates a registry of data brokers selling children's information. The bill also funds research on chatbots' mental health effects on minors.
Why we flagged it
The bill's core function is to expand federal privacy protections for minors online by amending COPPA, restricting data broker sales of children's data, and mandating safety education and best-practice development. It is fundamentally a regulatory tightening, not a deregulation or carve-out.
What the text implies
- The bill extends COPPA's reach to teens (14–17), a significant expansion that may affect social media platforms' business models more than the original child-focused rule.
- The data broker registry and $22,500+ annual registration fee may create barriers to entry for smaller data brokers, potentially consolidating the industry among larger players with compliance resources.
- The 'should have known' standard for age knowledge imposes an affirmative duty on operators to assess user age, which may incentivize age-gating or identity verification systems not explicitly required but practically necessary.
- Educational resources on chatbot risks (Section 524) are non-binding and advisory; the bill does not restrict chatbot deployment or require warnings, only information provision.
- The Kids Internet Safety Partnership sunsets after 5 years, creating uncertainty about continuity of best-practice development and coordination.
Section numbers refer to the bill text the analysis read — linked under Primary records below.
Who it affects
The bill substantially expands privacy protections and parental controls for minors online, restricts data collection and targeted advertising to children, and creates transparency mechanisms (registries, reports, educational resources). While compliance costs may be passed to consumers, the primary effect is to constrain corporate data practices and empower parents and teens with deletion rights, consent requirements, and access to information about their data.
Who stands to gain
- Compliance and privacy technology vendors
- Age verification and identity service providers
- Educational content creators and safety consultants
Named in the bill
Federal Trade Commission (FTC), National Institutes of Health (NIH), Department of Commerce, State attorneys general, Online platforms and social media companies, Data brokers, Educational agencies and institutions
Where it stands
1 cosponsor: 1 Democrats.
- Mar 3, 2026 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in House”
- Mar 3, 2026 — Referred to House Committee on the Judiciary and House Committee on Energy and Commerce · Congress.gov: “Referred to the Committee on Energy and Commerce, and in addition to the Committee on the Judiciary, for a…”
- Jun 29, 2026 — Passed the House · Congress.gov: “On motion to suspend the rules and pass the bill, as amended Agreed to by the Yeas and Nays: (2/3 required)…”
- Jun 29, 2026 — Floor vote scheduled · Congress.gov: “Mr. Guthrie moved to suspend the rules and pass the bill, as amended”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Money around this bill
69 lobbying clients named this bill on 72 disclosure filings across 2 quarters, Mar 2026 to Jun 2026. Those filings disclosed $29,111,573 in lobbying spend. A filing names 8 bills on average, so that figure is what each filing reported, not a share belonging to this bill.
More lobbying clients named this bill than 99% of bills with at least one filing.
Brett Guthrie, the sponsor, reported $3,193,402 in PAC receipts in the 2026 cycle. $7,500 of that came from 3 PACs tied to these lobbying clients.
- Ctia-the Wireless Association — $3,640,000 on 1 filing
- Verizon Communications Inc and Various Subsidiaries — $3,050,000 on 1 filing
- Apple Inc — $2,740,000 on 1 filing
- American Property Casualty Insurance Association — $2,140,000 on 1 filing
- Anthropic — $1,970,000 on 1 filing
Lobbying Disclosure Act filings through Jul 23, 2026. A filing shows who paid to lobby on a bill it names, not what changed.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the bill text published by Congress.gov (50,012 characters) on Jul 1, 2026. Section numbers in the findings refer to that text, linked below; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 16,222 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
Money — Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act filings whose specific-issue field names this bill for quarters ending Mar 2026 to Jun 2026. A filing's amount is reported whole beside the median number of bills a filing names; it is never divided across them. PAC receipts are FEC-reported contributions to the sponsor's candidate committee in the 2026 cycle.
As of — lobbying records through Jul 23, 2026 · page rendered 2026-10-20.
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