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What we call "age verification" is actually mass surveillance

pluralistic.net

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Re: What we call "age verification" is actually mass surveillance

#261

Post by CPLX »

rootusrootus wrote: post #251
CPLX wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No let's not. Let's actually create and maintain a society. There are still places in the world where you and your family can literally fend for yourself against nature and rival gangs and so on if you're just super attached to the concept though, it's not like this option has been foreclosed.

This discussion is about the Internet. I.e. that we already have police and regulate in-person things like selling alcohol to minors, etc, is not a great argument in support of policing information .

If you call pornograpy and violence delivery to children "providing them with information" then sure but most normal people just consider that a bad thing that we'd like to avoid and definitely would like to stop sociopathic tech CEO's from exploiting for profit.

But back to your original point, it's a pretty well-established function of government to protect the children within its borders from being harmed.

Re: What we call "age verification" is actually mass surveillance

#262

Post by CPLX »

fluoridation wrote: post #242
CPLX wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes there is. You need to pay for a drivers license or a passport and so on. So there is an intrinsic cost to prove who you are where you are from and what your birthday is already. You have to pay for all sorts of small things to participate in normal society. This isn't a serious criticism. By definition this is not a life critical thing, it's something that is procured in order to access specific services on the i…

>You need to pay for a drivers license or a passport and so on. I have a government ID and I didn't pay for it. I can use it to travel to nearby countries in lieu of a passport. The assumption that IDs are necessarily non-free (to the issuee) is pretty funny to me. >it's something that is procured in order to access specific services on the internet, which is not free. The maintenance of the Internet is already paid…

I mean, if you really want to make the government subsidize an ID verification scheme or mandate that certain real-world locations provide age verification as a social service for everyone, that's fine.

It's orthogonal to the discussion, though, which is about whether we should do it or not, because the costs here aren't significant and don't change the terms of the debate.

Re: What we call "age verification" is actually mass surveillance

#263

Post by krupan »

foo-bar-baz529 wrote: post #141

I don’t think saving them from spying is the main concern. Instead it’s the direct negative effects of the usage upon the kids that’s the concern. Not that age verification isn’t problematic

The possibly too subtle point of this article is that the spying is what makes the negative effects so powerful. Social media spies on what you are viewing and then sends you more of that, and send the info to other people so they can send you more of that too

Re: What we call "age verification" is actually mass surveillance

#264

Post by manapause »

Aaargh20318 wrote: post #93
Wowfunhappy wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you be more specific as to what you're imagining? I don't personally see a way to verify someone's age which doesn't involve either credit card verification, photo id verification, or some sort of facial recognition. If you know enough about someone to verify their age—even to a relatively low degree of accuracy—you probably know enough to pinpoint who they are in general. Heck—in most cases, we can't even tell…

The way identity wallets work: The government issues an eID to your wallet. The ID is signed by the government and linked to the device to prevent transferring the credential. A public/private key-pair is generated by the secure enclave in your phone, the public key along with proof of possession of the private key is included in the request for the government eID. The government signs individual attributes combined…

What about at the device level?

“You must be this tall to ride this ride”

“ you must be 18 to own an iPhone 18+ “

I apologize for the drive-by question, and I appreciate your takes!

Re: What we call "age verification" is actually mass surveillance

#266

Post by inigyou »

ekr____ wrote: post #212
inigyou wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can get their exact age by binary search.

Typically these APIs are designed so you can't make arbitrary queries, but rather there are fixed age brackets.

Then it can't be bool isOver(int age)

Re: What we call "age verification" is actually mass surveillance

#267

Post by al_borland »

krupan wrote: post #259

Parents largely control what their kids have access to, whether it requires a device, a data plan, home Wi-Fi, whatever. Where parents don't/can't control their kids' access, no amount of regulation and technology will fix it. This applies not just to social media, but drugs, alcohol, porn, etc. Yes, laws and IDs add friction and that's good, but if a kid really wants those things they are going to find a way. Social…

Even as an adult who doesn't use social media, I find the use of Facebook as a company home page, or using it as a forum for group communication, to be problematic. Especially as Meta makes it more and more difficult to see content without an account.

Re: What we call "age verification" is actually mass surveillance

#268

Post by mcfedr »

Aaargh20318 wrote: post #93
Wowfunhappy wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you be more specific as to what you're imagining? I don't personally see a way to verify someone's age which doesn't involve either credit card verification, photo id verification, or some sort of facial recognition. If you know enough about someone to verify their age—even to a relatively low degree of accuracy—you probably know enough to pinpoint who they are in general. Heck—in most cases, we can't even tell…

The way identity wallets work: The government issues an eID to your wallet. The ID is signed by the government and linked to the device to prevent transferring the credential. A public/private key-pair is generated by the secure enclave in your phone, the public key along with proof of possession of the private key is included in the request for the government eID. The government signs individual attributes combined…

Which part of that is avoiding the distopian control?

the very first line, government issued digital id - we have been avoiding that for a very long time

how does this work on an open source operating system?

Re: What we call "age verification" is actually mass surveillance

#269

Post by jonathanstrange »

rootusrootus wrote: post #257
jonathanstrange wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, but I'm not against selling alcohol and fast sports cars to adults, for example. I'm not very fond of a nanny state that prohibits almost everything to adults "for their sake" and because the government knows so much better.

It is somewhat more challenging for the vendor selling alcohol or sports cars to manipulate your thinking, so the analogy is strained.

[citation needed]

Re: What we call "age verification" is actually mass surveillance

#270

Post by llbbdd »

therealdrag0 wrote: post #144

Am I the only one who looked at NSFW websites at 10 years old and played games with voice chat with players of all ages too, and I turned out to be well adjusted productive member of society? People need to chill.

Same here. Every time a thread like this comes up it brings out that a surprising number of paranoid helicopter parents browse HN, which is a contradiction in perspective that I can't really emphasize with.
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