In Utah, which has passed state-approved digital identity (SEDI) legislation, Veridian, created by the Cardano Foundation, has already shown that digital identity can be issued in a privacy-preserving manner, allowing users to prove they are over or under a specific age without exposing other data. This is a working model of what responsible verification can look like and shows that trust does not require unnecessary disclosure. Privacy can be built into the system from the start.
This is what standard bills like KIDS or KOSA should focus on.
If the goal is to protect children, tools must be restricted, targeted and minimally invasive. Blanket mandates that push every platform toward more data, more retention, and a greater reliance on identity are too direct and risk creating a host of other problems beyond the ones they claim to solve.
A better approach is simple. Design to minimize data, limit retention, and use privacy-preserving verification where verification is truly needed. If digital trust can be established without exposing personal data, lawmakers should prefer this route. If security can be improved without turning the Internet into an identity checkpoint, that should be the only option.
Children deserve to be protected online. But they don’t need a policy framework that makes everyone more visible in order to make the Internet, and the businesses that thrive on it, more accountable.
