February 21, 2026
Your OS is now the bouncer
Colorado moves age checks from websites to operating systems
Colorado wants your phone to card you — fans cheer, critics cry “creeps”
TLDR: Colorado wants phones to handle age checks, sending apps an age signal instead of sites asking for IDs. Commenters are split: some love the simplicity, others fear Big Tech gatekeeping and a “war on general purpose computing,” while legal watchers wonder if this heads to the Supreme Court.
Colorado’s new plan would make your phone’s operating system the gatekeeper: when you create an account, the OS collects your age and sends an “age bracket” signal to apps, which must use it. Instead of every website asking for IDs, the state wants the checks baked into the device layer. It’s the latest try after past Colorado bills targeting websites or social media fizzled or got vetoed.
The internet crowd is spicy about it. One camp is popping confetti — “Finally, sensible,” says aurareturn, celebrating a single, scalable system instead of a thousand pop-ups. The other camp is throwing tomatoes: jauntywundrkind calls it “the war on general purpose computing,” blasting governments for turning Big Tech into hall monitors. A privacy-minded middle likes the idea if it’s local-first (device confirms age without sharing IDs), but warns it could cement Apple/Google as the universal bouncers. Cue the classics: userbinator drops a link to Richard Stallman’s prophecy-piece Right to Read, and geuis wonders if this fight ends at the Supreme Court.
Meanwhile, the memes write themselves: “Your OS is the bouncer,” “No phone, no entry,” and “Colorado just turned parental controls into state controls.” The drama: simpler tech vs. bigger gatekeepers, kid safety vs. adult rights — and everyone thinks they’re the hero.
Key Points
- •SB 26-051 would require operating system providers to collect users’ age or birthdate at account creation.
- •The bill mandates generating an age bracket signal accessible to developers via an API and requires developers to use it.
- •It avoids direct regulation of individual websites, embedding age attestation at the OS account layer within app store ecosystems.
- •SB 25-201 in 2025 sought mandatory website age checks with privacy safeguards but failed amid First Amendment and enforcement concerns.
- •SB 25-086 targeted social media age categorization and was vetoed by Governor Jared Polis in April 2025 for feasibility and constitutional reasons.