Maryland lawmakers certainly saw this coming, & were warned of the constitutional implications. Indeed, NetChoice cites a letter from the AG's office to MD's governor warning of the risk a court would find some of the Act's provisions unconstitutional under the First Amendment.

Fourth, NetChoice challenges the law's restrictions on '"processing" and "profiling" information under the First Amendment, insofar as those restrictions impact the collection and use information for "curating, recommending, and delivering protected speech to users"

Third, NetChoice challenges the Data Protection Impact Assessment (DPIA) requirements as unconstitutionally compelling speech in violation of the First Amendment. The 9th Circuit held similar requirements in CA's law to be unconstitutional.

Second, NetChoice challenges the "reasonably likely to be accessed by children" standard in the Act's central coverage definition as unconstitutionally vague and violating priciples of free speech.

As such, covered entities are forced to make "subjective and indeterminate considerations" about their impact on all minors - regardless of differences in age, etc..encouraging covered websites to default to content and services befitting the youngest and most sensitive users.

First, NetChoice alleges the requirement that covered entities operate in the "best interests of children" is unconstitutionally vague and standardless, grants "unbridled discretion" to government officials, leaves many terms undefined, and will "chill vast amounts of expression

But, MD's law still fails constitutional scrutiny. Per @NetChoice, "Here, Maryland purports to regulate data. But regulating how online services present expressive content to their users is not a data regulation..it is a regulation of the dissemination and display of speech.”

Maryland's Age-Appropriate Design Code Act is facing a (predictable) constitutional challenge, with @NetChoice filing a lawsuit today to block the law, calling it "sweeping restrictions on free speech" that “impose an unconstitutional and unlawful regime" netchoice.org/wp-content/...