TL;DR: The bill does not ban anyone under 18 from chatting online. It requires age verification and then requires that children not be allowed to be viewed, DM'd, tagged or sent money by anyone not connected to them (on their friend's list). It requires the site to allow parents to opt out of this feature.

This article was posted 3 hours ago and it doesn't seem like any of the commenters here have read past the headline. Everyone is reacting to the headline and the headline is flat out wrong.

This bill does not ban anyone under 18 from chatting online.

It does require age verification, however:

§ 1510. Privacy by default. 1. No operator shall offer a covered platform in this state without conducting commercially reasonable age verification to determine whether a user is a covered minor. The attorney general shall promulgate regulations identifying methods for commercially reasonable and technically feasible age verification

If a person is determined to be a minor then:

operator shall utilize the following settings by default for covered minors, which shall ensure that no user who is not already connected to a covered minor may:

(a.)communicate directly and privately with such minor;

(b.) view the profile of such minor;

(c.) tag such minor in posted content; and/or

(d.) engage in a financial transaction with such minor.

3.) A parent of a covered minor may override the default privacy settings provided in subdivision two of this section at such parent's discretion.

4.) An operator shall notify a parent of a covered minor whenever such covered minor attempts to change the default settings provided in subdivision two of this section. The parent may then either approve or deny the request to change the settings for such minor.

The bill makes it so that strangers can't DM children, tag them in photographs, or send them money. It allows parents to choose to opt out of this feature and it requires that sites not use Dark Patterns to interfere with the opt-out process.

It does not, in any way, prevent children under 18 from chatting online. It prevents people from DMing children and sending them money.

Violations allow the AG can sue the company for damages and a $5,000 fine per occurrence.