Texas is the 3rd state to require app store age verification

The “please tread on me harder” state.

Obtainium no because it’s a github parser and I highly doubt they’ll implement it on the downloader.

F-Droid and other non-free anpp stores sure.

Accrescent may have to leave Texas, with all that privacy/security jaff.

The text of the new Texas law is here.

I wonder if this will apply to/be enforced on FDroid and Obtainium?

copying my comment from another thread:

“App store” means a publicly available Internet website, software application, or other electronic service that distributes software applications from the owner or developer of a software application to the user of a mobile device.

This sounds like it could apply not only to F-Droid but also to any website distributing APKs, and actually, every other software distribution sysem too (eg, linux distros…) which include software which could be run on a “mobile device” (the definition of which also can be read as including a laptop).

otoh i think they might have made a mistake and left a loophole; all of the requirements seem to depend on an age verification “under Section 121.021” and Section 121.021 says:

When an individual in this state creates an account with an app store, the owner of the app store shall use a commercially reasonable method of verification to verify the individual’s age category

I’m not a lawyer but I don’t see how this imposes any requirements on “app stores” which simply don’t have any account mechanism to begin with :)

(Not to say that this isn’t still immediately super harmful for the majority of the people who get their apps from Google and Apple…)

Right, so basically they’ll have a database of who has (had) what app, when, and where…

Which could include apps like Grindr (way to target the LGBT community), or like Signal (way to target Journalists, activists, and other privacy minded people). You can find out a lot about someone’s app choices and in a state like Texas, which is conservative and authoritarian, that can be used to go after certain demographics.

Awesome, now I need a VPN just to install an app…
With Fdroid and alt stores more than likely disappearing, it’s all turning to a shit show.

Is this the freedom y’all talk about?

what’s the second state? Only Utah is listed in that article.