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Age verification for social media, the beginning of the end for a free internet?

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Re: Age verification for social media, the beginning of the end for a free internet?

#211

Post by SiempreViernes »

jchw wrote: post #204
notepad0x90 wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is that the answer when even parents don't have the right tools for this. are parents supposed to surveil their kids 24/7 and monitor their internet traffic? Why is the internet special, do you also believe physical stores shouldn't check for ID for cigarettes and alcohol, because the solution is better parenting?

I never had to get my ID checked to be able to talk to strangers.

Did you to talk to the strangers in the night club when you were 11? Or were there several completely separate reasons for why you couldn't?

Re: Age verification for social media, the beginning of the end for a free internet?

#212

Post by elwebmaster »

There is no bona fide desire to solve the problem by the social media companies which are profiting from our kids. As a parent, I can never find the option to enable parental controls on apps like YouTube (especially on TV). This option is easy enough to implement locally without requiring any accounts or OS-level age support. However, clearly the goal is not to protect the children but to enable mass scale surveillance and profit from it. Even when I manage to enable parental controls by using a dedicated app or account (what nonsense is it that I need to create an account to restrict access!!!) the content being served is dubiously appropriate for the age group, aside from having no value whatsoever other than the intended goal of perpetuating addiction.

Re: Age verification for social media, the beginning of the end for a free internet?

#213

Post by SiempreViernes »

rockskon wrote: post #112
ethmarks wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they accept money and direct deposit still with no KYC. But to get the money out? Oh no! We need a picture of your face! Unauthorized deposits aren't nearly as much of a concern as unauthorized withdrawals, right? I'd imagine that there are far fewer malicious actors that try to deposit money into random bank accounts than there are ones that try to withdraw money from random bank accounts. > And there’s no option…

A bank's security camera feed isn't likely to be sold to dozens of companies. It is all but guaranteed for Internet-based facial recognition services. Hacked facial recognition data already is reportedly being used by scammers to not only bypass bank security but also to impersonate people to target their loved ones. There is no lasting security gain by providing a selfie. There is a lasting security and privacy loss…

So that's the concern? But GDPR solved this, just don't consent to them selling your likeness for AI training purposes.

Re: Age verification for social media, the beginning of the end for a free internet?

#214

Post by pflenker »

As a parent, what I find effective are content rating systems, be it for movies, games or apps, along with the ability to control and fine-tune them.

For example, with Apple's parental controls, I can blanket-decline access to Social Media apps, or to apps recommended for a specific age or older, and I can also allow exceptions as I see it fit (for example, my kids have no access to WhatsApp but they are allowed to use Signal, both have the same age recommendations)

This moves the responsibility for age verification to me, the parent, and provides me with suitable tools to monitor this. With this, there is no need for my kid or me to upload sensitive data or go through some bad age verification implementation.

Websites are more difficult to control, but not impossible.

Long story short - improve tooling for parents that allow more centralized control instead of mandating social media to do the age verification on their end.

Re: Age verification for social media, the beginning of the end for a free internet?

#215

Post by jenscow »

sunaookami wrote: post #185
armchairhacker wrote: post #146

Age verification is fine , at least in theory. It’s the implementations that are bad. More and more people agree that kids shouldn’t be on modern social media, including me. But most people also agree that mass surveillance is dangerous. The solution is to propose ways to block kids from modern social media (that actually works) without mass surveillance. Better parental controls, more parental education, and site-sp…

No, age-verification IS bad and is a slippery slope that will always lead to surveillance. If we don't stop this now everything will get worse. And trying to lump this in with other extreme rhetoric doesn't help. The answer is and always was "better parenting".

I won't disagree with that. And "better parenting" is a solution. However, what about the children who don't have the advantage of "better parenting"?

Rightfully blaming bad parents is reactionary

Re: Age verification for social media, the beginning of the end for a free internet?

#216

Post by coldtea »

jenscow wrote: post #215
sunaookami wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, age-verification IS bad and is a slippery slope that will always lead to surveillance. If we don't stop this now everything will get worse. And trying to lump this in with other extreme rhetoric doesn't help. The answer is and always was "better parenting".

I won't disagree with that. And "better parenting" is a solution. However, what about the children who don't have the advantage of "better parenting"? Rightfully blaming bad parents is reactionary

>Rightfully blaming bad parents is reactionary

So? Not all reactionary (if you mean "conservative") takes are bad. Sometimes they're better than the alternative: accepting bad parenting as some default and working around it with technological restrictions.

Re: Age verification for social media, the beginning of the end for a free internet?

#217

Post by phatfish »

Hugsbox wrote: post #206
armchairhacker wrote: post #146

Age verification is fine , at least in theory. It’s the implementations that are bad. More and more people agree that kids shouldn’t be on modern social media, including me. But most people also agree that mass surveillance is dangerous. The solution is to propose ways to block kids from modern social media (that actually works) without mass surveillance. Better parental controls, more parental education, and site-sp…

I don't believe children should be on social media. Some other people might not share that belief. Should be up to parents to decide what's okay for their kids, not governments or companies. Age verification will always lead to more surveillance. People need to just be more mindful of what their children are doing online, maybe stop giving them smartphones, and just be parents .

We don't let kids turn up to school drunk because they went to the cornershop on the way to school. I guarantee that would be happening if alcohol sales were not age gated and enforced by the government.

In the same way kids should not be infecting their minds with social media slop, or porn, or plenty of other internet content.

The only way this is stopped is when a social norm is created which shames all but the most negligent parents into compliance.

At the moment the absent and bad parents have all the power. Their kids scroll all night for memes, injest YouTube brainrot and turn up at school disruptive. Kids with responsible parents either want to that as well, or can't escape it.

Surveillance from age gates is a red herring. That horse bolted long ago. You are surveilled already by tech bros when voluntarily logging in, or by making yourself stand out a mile by using a VPN and a uncommon browser setup. This data gets handed to your government on request.

Having an anonymous VPN won't stop the tech bros or an authoritarian government forming, or bring one down.

People taking part in their existing democracy and maintaining the foundation of that is the best course of action. Raising a generation of kids not addicted to internet brainrot is a key part of this.

Re: Age verification for social media, the beginning of the end for a free internet?

#218

Post by intended »

sunaookami wrote: post #185
armchairhacker wrote: post #146

Age verification is fine , at least in theory. It’s the implementations that are bad. More and more people agree that kids shouldn’t be on modern social media, including me. But most people also agree that mass surveillance is dangerous. The solution is to propose ways to block kids from modern social media (that actually works) without mass surveillance. Better parental controls, more parental education, and site-sp…

No, age-verification IS bad and is a slippery slope that will always lead to surveillance. If we don't stop this now everything will get worse. And trying to lump this in with other extreme rhetoric doesn't help. The answer is and always was "better parenting".

HN is filled with people who are on the other side of an "internet best practices" information divide.

For everyone else, the internet is already a shit show and a half. They want control, because it means putting a stop to being predated upon, or more nihilistically, harming the firms that are harming them.

I don't know how to let other commenters see how bad it is, or make the gulf in view points clear.

Re: Age verification for social media, the beginning of the end for a free internet?

#219

Post by [deleted] »

sunaookami wrote: post #185
armchairhacker wrote: post #146

Age verification is fine , at least in theory. It’s the implementations that are bad. More and more people agree that kids shouldn’t be on modern social media, including me. But most people also agree that mass surveillance is dangerous. The solution is to propose ways to block kids from modern social media (that actually works) without mass surveillance. Better parental controls, more parental education, and site-sp…

No, age-verification IS bad and is a slippery slope that will always lead to surveillance. If we don't stop this now everything will get worse. And trying to lump this in with other extreme rhetoric doesn't help. The answer is and always was "better parenting".

[deleted]

Re: Age verification for social media, the beginning of the end for a free internet?

#220

Post by [deleted] »

Hugsbox wrote: post #206
armchairhacker wrote: post #146

Age verification is fine , at least in theory. It’s the implementations that are bad. More and more people agree that kids shouldn’t be on modern social media, including me. But most people also agree that mass surveillance is dangerous. The solution is to propose ways to block kids from modern social media (that actually works) without mass surveillance. Better parental controls, more parental education, and site-sp…

I don't believe children should be on social media. Some other people might not share that belief. Should be up to parents to decide what's okay for their kids, not governments or companies. Age verification will always lead to more surveillance. People need to just be more mindful of what their children are doing online, maybe stop giving them smartphones, and just be parents .

[deleted]
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