1. United States
2. Mich.
3. Letter

I'm asking you to oppose the operating system age verification bill introduced by Representatives Gottheimer and Stefanik on April 13th and currently in the House Committee on Energy and Commerce. This legislation is a Trojan horse for mass surveillance. Requiring Apple, Google, and other OS providers to verify ages before device setup means collecting and storing sensitive identity data on every American who buys a phone, computer, or tablet. The bill text doesn't specify verification methods, leaving the door open for mandatory ID uploads and biometric scans. That data will be centralized, tracked, and inevitably leaked. We've seen this pattern before with data breaches affecting millions. The vague phrase "and for other purposes" in the bill title signals scope creep. What starts as age verification becomes a framework for monitoring what every user accesses and when. This isn't about protecting children. Parents already have tools to manage their kids' devices. This is about creating infrastructure for tracking everyone. The technical burden alone would devastate open-source systems like Linux while entrenching the power of a few massive tech companies. Vote no on this bill and any similar legislation that trades privacy for the illusion of safety.