California lawmakers are considering a change to the state’s upcoming age-assurance law that would exempt most open-source operating systems, including many Linux distributions, from collecting users’ age during device setup. The shift follows months of backlash to the original Digital Age Assurance Act, passed in late 2025, which aimed to move age verification from individual websites and apps to the operating-system level. Under the earlier law, operating systems would request a user’s age or birth date during setup and then provide an “age bracket signal” for apps and app stores, using defined brackets such as “under 13,” “13–15,” “16–17,” and “18+.”
Multiple reports describe the amendment as narrowing the definition of who qualifies as an “operating system provider.” The proposed measure, Assembly Bill 1856 (AB 1856), would exclude entities that distribute software under licenses that allow recipients to “copy, redistribute, and modify” the software. The amendment does not repeal the original act; instead, it adjusts compliance responsibility so that open-source distributions are more likely to be outside the law’s scope. Commercial platforms tied to proprietary app ecosystems may still face compliance questions. AB 1856 is advancing through California’s legislative process, including committee review steps scheduled for June.
