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Age verification is incompatible with the internet

jonaharagon.com

41–50 of 161 posts

Re: Age verification is incompatible with the internet

#41
post #17

This should not be that hard. How about: - At point of purchase for a consumer device that can view Internet content, the salesperson (or web store) is required to ask if the device is for an underage child, in which case either the device is placed in "child safe" mode, or printed instructions are directly provided giving instructions to do such. The child protection settings should be linked to the parent's e-mail…

These sorts of features shouldn’t be mandatory, if parents want to lock down their kids’ devices they can go find and buy the ones that support that sort of thing. Or install aftermarket software. This is already the way it works. Also underage people could go to the store and lie about their age, so if we want this plan to be effective we’d need to ID everybody buying electronics, which would be annoying. It also is…

My point wasn't that this should be done, just that it's a more viable option if moral busybody legislators actually want to legally restrict children's access to adult content instead of finding creative ways of harassing Pornhub.

Obviously porn blocking should just be something parents should concern themselves with, and parents alone. Software and device vendors already provide all the necessary tools.

Re: Age verification is incompatible with the internet

#42
post #17

This should not be that hard. How about: - At point of purchase for a consumer device that can view Internet content, the salesperson (or web store) is required to ask if the device is for an underage child, in which case either the device is placed in "child safe" mode, or printed instructions are directly provided giving instructions to do such. The child protection settings should be linked to the parent's e-mail…

Couldn’t a proxy just bypass this filter?

Just as with the “you must be at least 18 to view this site, only click ok if you’re at least 18” popups, I’m pretty sure a smart 17 year old could figure out that notpornhub.com silently drops the special filter tag but is otherwise identical to pornhub.com

Re: Age verification is incompatible with the internet

#43

There are valid complaints to the idea being challenged, but it absolutely can be done technically and through legislation enforcing technical controls. Sophisticated users will use VPNs if they want to evade geoblocks, your average person won't (and any business that attempts to help them will be met with a legal hammer), and digital IDs are both reasonable and feasible to deploy at nation scale. Should it be used t…

We talk about legislative solutions as if they exist in a bubble. Like there’s some idealized body of completely rational actors who will deliberately evaluate all the features of an issue and make a decision that will benefit everyone in aggregate. This is not how legislatures work. They are filled with imperfect humans who rarely have technical training. They should not be making decisions in a bubble. In theory yo…

Except the mDL specifically accounted for this and allows anonymous age verification records and it’s a standard so there’s no real lock in (there’s some on the provider side in terms of the IT systems to do the signing but that’s self inflicted in many ways). And the lock in described in that section that alludes to the mDL seems mostly like FUD - there’s no requirement you use a Google/Apple wallet. Indeed most of the pilot programs are starting with apps released by the motor licensing agency itself. Now there may be more “lock in” enforced to close loopholes for the really technically minded, but honestly this feels like a fine middle ground starting point.

Re: Age verification is incompatible with the internet

#44
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This, but unironically. ... though it probably shouldn't use the same age cutoff as beer. 18 or even 15 would be better. The downside is that - even with mild enforcement - fast food would get even more expensive for people who buy the cheap items which are currently subsidized by drinks.

I feel like a lot of the comments here are said ironically but would actually be wonderful for much of society. Very tired of the libertarian arguments when they obviously don't work.

Libertarianism doesn’t work as much as communism doesn’t work.

Re: Age verification is incompatible with the internet

#45

Parents and caretakers have the ability to restrict children’s content on any device a child has access to. The burden should be on them to ensure their child is not consuming porn. It shouldn’t be everyone else’s problem that people are unwilling to parent their children.

>The burden should be on them to ensure their child is not consuming porn

This argument is essentially that it's acceptable for websites to show porn to children if their parents don't care or are fine with it.

It's a horrible, dangerous thing regardless of if parents are involved are not, and therefore should not solely be the responsibility of the parents.

Re: Age verification is incompatible with the internet

#47
post #10

AV is already widely utilized by thousands of internet companies and represents a significant market. The issue is the companies being targeted have simply chosen to not enact any AV or gating measures because it would impact their existing business. Additionally, the targeted companies have solutions available but are leveraging legal and lobbying efforts vs. changing their business. Source: I work for a company tha…

How are users supposed to know where they can and can't safely upload a sensitive picture of their ID?

You’re thinking about AV as it’s been rolled out in the past few years in places. But the mDL / mobile passports don’t require that - it’s a signed record that a certain government agency signs. It can be something like signing what kind of vehicles you can operate but also can be just an anonymous age verification check. The standards body for this was explicitly thinking about privacy-preserving mechanisms to do AV (I know because I attended some meetings and observed the discussions they were having).

Re: Age verification is incompatible with the internet

#48
post #24
post #17

This should not be that hard. How about: - At point of purchase for a consumer device that can view Internet content, the salesperson (or web store) is required to ask if the device is for an underage child, in which case either the device is placed in "child safe" mode, or printed instructions are directly provided giving instructions to do such. The child protection settings should be linked to the parent's e-mail…

> Adult sites are required to list themselves as such so they can be filtered (they already do this quite voluntarily). There's actually a meta tag that most adult sites set to do this already. It's also used by Google to identify a website as adult for SafeSearch reasons. The process seems simple enough, https://www.rtalabel.org/index.html?content=howto (meta tag) and https://www.rtalabel.org/index.html?content=howt…

Because they would just download a custom browser that allows it.

Re: Age verification is incompatible with the internet

#49
It's up to parents to lock down their kids from tech they shouldn't be accessing, the rest of us shouldn't be harassed and inconvenienced for that. I hate to beat a dead horse, but it comes down to personal responsibility, "what are your kids doing right now?"

Re: Age verification is incompatible with the internet

#50
post #9

Parents and caretakers have the ability to restrict children’s content on any device a child has access to. The burden should be on them to ensure their child is not consuming porn. It shouldn’t be everyone else’s problem that people are unwilling to parent their children.

Yes parents should restrict their kids devices and keep an eye smart device usage generally IMHO. However, doing so well is not easy. There’s so many work arounds unless you severely limit device functionality. For example, at least a few years back it was basically impossible to enforce DNS based filtering on iOS devices much less other more invasive setups.

There is a very basic iphone setting that restricts adult content from a huge list of sites plus any other sites you want to add to it. This tech has been around for decades.
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