Definition
The EARN IT Act (“Eliminating Abusive and Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technologies Act”) is a US federal bill — championed by Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) — that conditions a platform’s Section 230 immunity on “earning” it through compliance with a federal commission’s content-scanning standards aimed at child sexual abuse material (CSAM). Introduced in 2020, 2022, and again in 2023; passed Senate Judiciary Committee unanimously by voice vote in May 2023. Widely understood by encryption advocates as a vehicle to undermine end-to-end encryption (E2EE) by making compliance practically impossible while encryption is in place.
Why It Matters for the Newsletter
EARN IT is the encryption-attack vehicle of the Bad Internet Bills Campaign cluster. Where KOSA uses duty-of-care to chill content, EARN IT uses Section 230 conditionality to chill encryption infrastructure. Together with TAKE IT DOWN, STOP CSAM, and Cooper Davis, it forms the “encryption pincer” — multiple bills attacking E2EE from different angles, ensuring at least one passes. Notable for being a second Trump-era bipartisan-Democrat-supported bill where digital rights groups, criminal justice reformers (NAACP LDF), and human rights orgs are uniformly opposed.
Evidence & Examples
- Senate Judiciary unanimous voice vote (May 2023): Congress is flooded with bills for childproofing the internet — Cory Booker and Jon Ossoff raised cybersecurity concerns but didn’t block the vote.
- Third reintroduction: Bad Internet Bills — Fight for the Future Campaign Hub — “lawmakers are introducing EARN IT for a third time, hoping to pass it and break the internet while we’re distracted.”
- Also covered in: President Biden’s executive action on children and the internet — alongside KOSA, COPPA 2.0, Protecting Kids on Social Media Act in the May 2023 wave.
- NaaCP LDF and criminal justice opposition: EARN IT’s expanded surveillance power flagged as racially disparate-impact concern (cited in Bad Internet Bills hub).
Tensions & Counterarguments
- Defenders argue: EARN IT does not directly mandate breaking encryption; it just requires platforms to take CSAM-mitigation steps. Encryption advocates respond that good-faith compliance with content-scanning standards is impossible while end-to-end encryption is in place — making E2EE deprecation the practical effect.
- CSAM framing: Like SESTA/FOSTA’s anti-trafficking framing, the political case for EARN IT is wrapped in a near-uncontroversial harm. Opponents (NAACP LDF, EFF, Fight for the Future, etc.) argue the bill would actually harm CSAM prosecutions by repeating SESTA/FOSTA’s mistakes.
- Booker/Ossoff dissent: Both Senate Democrats have raised explicit cybersecurity concerns at committee yet did not block the bill — illustrating the pattern of Democratic complicity even where the policy concern is on-record.
Related Concepts
- Section 230 — the protection EARN IT conditions
- End-to-End Encryption
- KOSA — companion bill
- STOP CSAM — parallel encryption-attack vehicle
- Cooper Davis Act — fentanyl-pretext encryption attack
- TAKE IT DOWN Act — NCII-pretext encryption attack
- FOSTA — historical precedent
- Bad Internet Bills Campaign