The United States may be home to the global epicenter of technology and innovation, but when it comes to things like voting machines, air traffic control, and sunscreen, we might as well be running Windows ME. Yep, to find some of the most outdated sun protection products in the world, look no further than the shelves of your local American drugstore. For years, the US Food and Drug Administration dragged its heels to do something about that, even as Europe—which treats sunscreens as cosmetics rather than over-the-counter drugs—embraced new kinds of solar radiation-stymying schmears, sticks, and sprays.

But no longer!

On Thursday, FDA commissioner Scott Gottlieb announced that the agency is finally beginning a process to update the way it regulates sunscreens, in an effort to bring them in line with 21st-century science. The US has not approved any new photoprotective molecules, the active ingredients in sunscreen, also known as UV filters, since the Clinton administration. In the meantime, new research has raised concerns about how some of these active ingredients affect the human body and the environment. “Since the initial evaluation of these products, we know much more about the effects of the sun and about sunscreen’s absorption through the skin,” Gottlieb said in a released statement. “Today’s action is an important step in the FDA’s ongoing efforts to take into account modern science to ensure the safety and effectiveness of sunscreens.”

For now, the new regulations are just proposals. The public will have 90 days to submit written comments, which the agency will then evaluate before making the rules final. But there are some big changes that could have significant implications for sunscreen manufacturers come November, when the FDA’s deadline for establishing its updated industry guidelines comes due.

Chief among the changes is the FDA’s proposal to reevaluate the 16 currently approved ingredients on the market. The agency has now classified only two—zinc oxide and titanium dioxide—out of the 16 as being “generally recognized as safe and effective,” the so-called GRASE standard. The agency named PABA and trolamine salicylate as not safe for nonprescription use. And for the remaining 12, even though some of these filters have been in use for decades, the agency feels there isn’t sufficient evidence to grant them GRASE status. To prove that they are, the FDA is asking sunscreen-makers to submit additional data, including new tests to measure how the body absorbs those ingredients into the bloodstream and what effects they might have on various tissues, especially over many, chronic applications.

“Thus far there’s been no indication that any of these 12 UV filters currently on the market are unsafe in humans,” says Henry Lim, a dermatologist at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit and the former president of the American Academy of Dermatology. He stresses that people shouldn’t panic and dump all their tubes in the trash. Sunscreen, he says, is still an important tool for limiting exposure to ultraviolet rays, a major risk factor for skin cancer. “But because of the different nature of these UV filters, the FDA wants companies to submit more data from absorption studies.”

Different how? Well, what you’re paying for when you buy a bottle of sunscreen are the molecules that scatter and absorb UV radiation emitted from the ball of hot gas and plasma at the center of the solar system. In order to fend off frequencies that can damage your DNA and lead to cancer-causing mutations, these molecules must be able to block both UVA and UVB wavelengths (about 320–400 and 290–320 nanometers, respectively). These kinds of molecules come in two flavors: organic and inorganic.