We Failed. HB5511 passed June 1, 2026.

Current Status -SB3977

Original Bill -SB3977

Amendment (4/13/2026) -SB3977

Full Bill -HB5511

This site will be left as a vestige of my personal fight against the government overreach that is sweeping our nation, starting in California, New York, and Colorado. It found it’s way to Illinois, and poses a grave danger to open source projects and users of computing devices.

Lawmakers also did not consider the ability of malicious actors to use the age signals that this bill would force operating systems to provide them. Bills like these make it much easier for malicious actors to find and exploit children, which majorly defeats the purpose of this bill, which only considers the implications upon law-abiding social media sites.

An Open Letter to J.B. Pritzker

Update: This bill (HB5511) has passed the House. Please read the bill and understand it for yourself. Do not take my opinions as your own. Then, if you decide you oppose it, contact your senator, and inform your friends and family about it.

The further I read this, the more convinced I am that this is overreach of the worst variety. After this bill (SB377) went to committee, the most notable amendment to it is the addition of paid “family” accounts, which would allow users to bypass child accounts, at a monthly cost. They also amended the portion of the bill that would cover smart toasters, but that still would cover any DOS variant, including the FOSS FreeDOS I mention. Keep that in mind when reading my original opinion.

My Opinion: This is, without a doubt, governmental overreach. This bill, as proposed and currently amended, compels operating system providers of any size to implement an API that would register the age of the user. Not only is this more information than any system should need about it’s user, it also could force small, open-source projects out of business by fining them up to $60,000 per instance… that means each user in Illinois.

Based on the language of the bill, this could apply to IoT devices, such as your internet-connected thermostat, television, or other home appliance. (This is because all of these are able to be considered “General-Purpose Computing Devices, a term which is wholly undefined in Illinois law). This bill could also apply to single-user, single-tasking operating systems, such as PC/MS-DOS, or the modern FreeDOS. Not only do I find the entire suggestion patently absurd as a whole, the exceptionally broad definition of operating system lends the entire bill a suggestion of satire. Unfortunately, it is not.

Memes, to make you feel better about the insanity: