Fewer People Support Censoring False Information Online
Support for suppressing "violent content" has also dropped.
The percentage of Americans who think the government should "take steps to restrict false information online" is shrinking.
According to new data from the Pew Research Center, Americans are losing patience for the idea that the government should censor in the name of stopping misinformation.
Pew also found decreasing support for the idea that tech companies should make such efforts on their own.
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In 2023, 55 percent of people surveyed agreed with the idea that the U.S. government "should take steps to restrict false information online, even if it limits freedom of info." And 65 percent of those surveyed thought that tech companies should do this.
Support for both statements has decreased. In Pew's 2025 survey, just 51 percent agreed with the statement about the U.S. government, and 60 percent agreed with the statement about tech companies.
The Good News
The good news here is we may be seeing an uptick in people who view free speech as a more important value than some utopian ideal of online safety. Perhaps people have started to realize that systems tasked with stopping false information online will inevitably make mistakes and exhibit biases.
Speech that is categorically not misinformation will sometimes get swept up, especially when companies are relying on algorithms as a first line of misinformation defense.
Moreover, what qualifies as misinformation is not always so simple to determine. Things deemed misinformation at one point (like the lab leak hypothesis of COVID-19 origins, or the Hunter Biden laptop story) may later turn out to be true or at least possible. Things called misinformation by one group of people may be seen differently by people with different political, religious, or moral views. In many situations, saying who is right and who isn't requires prioritizing one set of values over another, or making judgement calls on complicated scientific matters that may not be settled yet.
And even when some story or piece of information is clearly false, suppressing it can cause more damage than good. At the very least, there's no evidence that stopping the spread of misinformation in certain online venues will actually stop people from believing that information, especially when politicians and offline pundits still spread it.
For those inclined to believe the false story, its suppression could end up strengthening their resolve that it is correct. Suppressing talk of the false story can even deprive people of opportunities to counter it, with people directly challenging the falsehoods often getting got up by the same suppression rules as those spreading the falsehoods.
We've seen so many examples of all of these scenarios in recent years that it would be depressing if the message wasn't getting across somehow. So it's nice to see a survey suggesting that, at least to some small degree, it is.
The Bad News
The Pew survey still shows a lot of people who want the government to stop misinformation online, and who are willing to sacrifice freedom of information for this goal. For both the government and the tech question, a majority are in support.
And while these percentages may have decreased since 2023, they're still higher than they were not very long ago.
In 2021, just 48 percent of people surveyed agreed with the idea that the U.S. government should take step to restrict false information online even when it required limiting freedom of in formations, and in 2018 just 39 percent of people agreed with this statement.
On the question of tech companies suppressing false information, 59 percent agreed with that goal in 2021 and 56 percent agreed in 2018.
And while Republican respondents answers on the government question haven't varied too widely since 2018, Democratic responses seem to vary wildly based on who is in power. In 2018, during Donald Trump's first term, just 40 percent wanted the government to try to restrict false information; in 2025, 58 percent wanted this. During Joe Biden's presidency, some 65 percent (in 2021) and 70 percent (in 2023) thought it was a good idea.
It's unsurprising that people will view their side as more capable of good judgment on such matters. But the policies and precedents set when their side is in power will survive far afterward, making such lopsided judgments shortsighted. As long as Dems believe censorship is OK when their people are in office, we'll continue to see not only dangerous censorship under Democratic administrations but no matter who is in power.
Suppressing Violent Content
Pew also asked about support for government or tech companies suppressing "violent content." Far fewer people in 2025 support either entity doing so.
In 2023, 60 percent of those surveyed said the U.S. government "should take steps to restrict extremely violent content online, even if it limits freedom of info." In 2025, this was down to 52 percent.
As for tech companies suppressing violent content, support dropped from 71 percent in 2023 to 58 percent in 2025.
Subverting Democracy and Free Speech, for the Children
Who needs to go through the whole messy democratic process of passing laws when you can just declare major policy changes? That seems to be the thought process of Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey. His office announced this month that he has ordered adult websites "to verify the age of users not just on the website but also on the device level—creating the most robust age-verification standard in the country."
While other states have debated such policies in their legislatures, Bailey is trying to unilaterally impose this new policy under the auspice of his consumer protection authority.
Bailey's new rule claims that failing to check IDs or use some other form of "commercially reasonable age verification technology" constitutes an "unfair practice" under the Missouri Merchandising Practices Act (MMPA). Bailey also claims that this is not a new policy at all, but merely a mechanism for enforcing the state's existing prohibitions on distributing pornography to people under age 18.
Even age verification rules adopted by state legislatures keep getting blocked by courts, on the grounds that they violate First Amendment rights. So it's possible that Bailey's mandate here will suffer a similar fate. Regardless of what ultimately happens, this attempt is notable because it represents an escalation of attempts to age-gate the internet.
More Sex & Tech News
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Next week, the DOJ will argue in a different court that Google should be forced to divest major business units, potentially including its Chrome internet browser and Android operating system, in the wake of an August 2024 guilty verdict for antitrust violations related to online search.
Google has already announced it will appeal Thursday's ad tech verdict. Pending appeals, the case will proceed to a similar remedies phase, where the DOJ is expected to seek the divestiture of a part of the ad tech business, which generated 12% of parent company Alphabet Inc.'s revenue last year, approximately $42 billion.
The ad tech case has been overshadowed in the public debate by the search case and antitrust suits against Amazon, Facebook, and Apple. The Trump Administration, usually eager to reverse course on many of former President Joe Biden's policies, has instead opted to continue all five major antitrust cases.
• A blow for Trump's executive order on gender identity: "A federal judge in Boston on Friday ordered the Trump administration to issue passports that reflect the self-identified gender of six transgender people rather than requiring that the passports display the sex on the applicants' original birth certificates," The New York Times reports. "The order from Judge Julia E. Kobick was a victory, at least temporarily, for the six plaintiffs, who she said were likely to prevail on their claim that a new policy by the Trump administration amounts to a form of unconstitutional sex discrimination under the Fifth Amendment, as well as the Administrative Procedures Act."
• ChatGPT developer OpenAI is considering launching its own social media platform. The Atlantic explains the logic: "People create data every time they post online, and generative-AI companies need a lot of data to train their products. Social networks are also sticky: If you got hooked on an OpenAI feed, you'd be less likely to use competing generative-AI products from Anthropic or Google."
• Today in signs of backsliding: Some states are urging the U.S. Supreme Court to reconsider its 2015 decision legalizing same sex marriage. "No one is suggesting that reconsideration of the decision in Obergefell is imminent," writes Amy Harmon in The New York Times. "Still, the number of state measures proposed signals an effort to shift the perception of same-sex marriage as an established civil right, leaders on both sides of the issue say."
• "After a federal court struck down their first attempt to limit teen social media use, Ohio lawmakers have a new approach: go through the app stores," reports Cleveland.com. "Under House Bill 226, app stores would ask users how old they are. Users would verify their age and those younger than 16 would need parental permission to download apps on their phones." You can find the full bill here.
• Customer service chatbots might "hallucinate" answers to support questions, as AI company Anysphere learned this week.
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