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The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

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Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#301

Post by paulddraper »

Aurornis wrote: post #93
paulddraper wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The verification service would tie the token to the IP address/geolocation. It would also throttle the number of identifications, or expire old ones. Yes, that can eventually be worked around, but not really that different than doing the verification today on someone else's device.

> The verification service would tie the token to the IP address So I'm constantly grabbing new tokens from the government every time I go from work WiFi to my cellular internet to the train WiFi and then home? Sounds like a fantastic point for capturing more tracking data. > /geolocation. Which means I have to send my geolocation data to apps to confirm I can use my token? Don't want that either. > It would also thr…

> Which means I have to send my geolocation data to apps to confirm I can use my token?

No, you don't need to send it there.

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#302

Post by LoganDark »

pastel8739 wrote: post #253
7e wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

How so?

Presumably, if you have a trusted application on a trusted device, the identifier was installed in a trusted way, the device is in trusted possession and the device won't be given to anyone else, trusted computing may be able, in certain cases, to make it more difficult for a remote minor to use the identifier.

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#303

Post by prmoustache »

johnc1 wrote: post #106
j2kun wrote: post #21

There are at least some technological solutions here, such as anonymous credentials. [1] Modern versions of this technique allow one to associate metadata (like a proof of age exceeding a threshold) in such a way that the verifier can't even correlate repeated requests across users. Governments that are serious about age verification and individual privacy (which, doubtful they truly are) should agree on a protocol a…

There is a much easier solution that already exists - parental controls on children's devices. I honestly don't understand why is it not solving the problem? Yes, parents are responsible to set this up. But parents are also responsible to lock their alcohol, drugs or guns, condoms, etc., and many other things. Perhaps parental controls are not good enough? That's where the regulation could genuinely help - require ch…

I think their point is to protect kids who have parents so tech illiterate they do not know how to manage parental controls.

Having seen some parents I kind of believe it but not to the point of wanting to implement ID tracking on everything.

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#304

Post by pmg101 »

subscribed wrote: post #165
johnc1 wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know! What puzzles me is responses every such article gets even on HN - let's build some cool tech that 95% of the general population and 100% of politicians won't even understand not to mention agree to. Yes, government want to end anonymity and that's clear to some. But governments enjoy on a pretty broad support for this and many people supporting this believe it's a real problem. Suggesting to leave it unsolved…

People on average aren't very smart and will happily support programs objectively harmful to them and everyone else because the government and a nice lady from the breakfast TV says it's necessary to think of someone's else's children watching porn (this soundbite is gross. I don't understand how it's okay for the serious people to repeat it).

Of course it's accurate to say a lot of people aren't smart.

A lot of people also may or may not be smart but have limited knowledge of this area and limited time/effort to expend thinking about it.

I don't think you should rail against those things because they will always be true for every topic.

Instead, people who have understood the deeper implications of this, for instance the typical HN reader, need to connect with the average person, engage with rather than dismiss their child protection fears, while explaining the downsides.

Taking a high handed dismissive attitude will not help to shift public opinion.

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#305

Post by hdgvhicv »

prmoustache wrote: post #303
johnc1 wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a much easier solution that already exists - parental controls on children's devices. I honestly don't understand why is it not solving the problem? Yes, parents are responsible to set this up. But parents are also responsible to lock their alcohol, drugs or guns, condoms, etc., and many other things. Perhaps parental controls are not good enough? That's where the regulation could genuinely help - require ch…

I think their point is to protect kids who have parents so tech illiterate they do not know how to manage parental controls. Having seen some parents I kind of believe it but not to the point of wanting to implement ID tracking on everything.

Have decent defaults. “Is this phone for a child” and “scan this wr from parents phone”. 90% of problems solved.

That said while Apple does a good job at parental controls, Microsoft is altered. Trying to have controls on Minecraft across a windows laptop and a switch involved a multi hour odyssey, creating tons of accounts for parent and child.

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#306

Post by hdgvhicv »

subscribed wrote: post #165
johnc1 wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know! What puzzles me is responses every such article gets even on HN - let's build some cool tech that 95% of the general population and 100% of politicians won't even understand not to mention agree to. Yes, government want to end anonymity and that's clear to some. But governments enjoy on a pretty broad support for this and many people supporting this believe it's a real problem. Suggesting to leave it unsolved…

People on average aren't very smart and will happily support programs objectively harmful to them and everyone else because the government and a nice lady from the breakfast TV says it's necessary to think of someone's else's children watching porn (this soundbite is gross. I don't understand how it's okay for the serious people to repeat it).

Once again blaming the tv which barely anyone watches rather than the algorithmic feed in their pocket 24 hours a day.

It’s not 1980 any more.

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#307

Post by grey-area »

Aurornis wrote: post #131
andrewla wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article talks about the possibilities of malicious cloning of these tokens by third parties, but fails to identify the much more common use case, and one that makes this scheme useless for age verification. It's one thing to be concerned about someone stealing my credential, but another to prevent the transfer of these credentials, especially if they are limited use credentials. The entire point of age verificati…

Yes, this is the part of the issue that is so frequently ignored: Anonymous age verification schemes are easily defeated through proxying because there wouldn't be any consequences for selling your tokens. "Install this app on your phone and we'll pay you $1 per day" and it will mint your anonymous identity tokens and send them off to kids who want to buy them. If there's no way to track the tokens, there is no possi…

The tokens could be tied to the device and Apple account by a provider like Apple, in fact you don’t need to issue tokens, only provide a web api that Apple and other browser providers support, which attests age.

This is certainly something that can be solved technically if we want.

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#308

Post by monssooon »

debesyla wrote: post #298
monssooon wrote: post #277

Do you think that this will lead to a new version of a alternative "internet" where people try to avoid the government control? And is that even possible? Or will we all just comply?

Only if it can be turned into gray market business: additional layers of proxies and VPNs, and whatever new is invented. As simple "I care about privacy" need is not a reason to bother with setup for a regular person. So it could work only if it's as easy, as current internet. And for profit businesses provide it. As for another protocol all together: there are some experiments already, but again, why use those?

Yeah profits is a problem.

I consider mesh-nets for home use... We already use walkies in the house...

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#309

Post by fc417fc802 »

mindslight wrote: post #276
johnc1 wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly! We already have content tags on TV/Movies, just extend it to the web and make mandatory. I imagine it could be not trivial to enforce (esp. for offshore web) - but definitely easier than enforcing the same sites to implement much more complicated identity verification (while preferably also not leaking this data). But that might not even be necessary. A small on-device AI can probably do a decent job classif…

> I imagine it could be not trivial to enforce (esp. for offshore web) It's quite trivial, actually - the parental control software is designed so that if there are no content tags, then the site does not display. The mandate for websites to tag their content would only need to apply to websites over a certain size, to bootstrap the network effects.

The other option is for the major browsers to refuse to load pages that don't include the tag. I don't think it's a good thing that they can unilaterally dictate web standards but that's the reality so might as well take advantage of it for the better I guess.

Re: The 'papers, please' era of the internet will decimate your privacy

#310

Post by throwaway72587 »

johnc1 wrote: post #106
j2kun wrote: post #21

There are at least some technological solutions here, such as anonymous credentials. [1] Modern versions of this technique allow one to associate metadata (like a proof of age exceeding a threshold) in such a way that the verifier can't even correlate repeated requests across users. Governments that are serious about age verification and individual privacy (which, doubtful they truly are) should agree on a protocol a…

There is a much easier solution that already exists - parental controls on children's devices. I honestly don't understand why is it not solving the problem? Yes, parents are responsible to set this up. But parents are also responsible to lock their alcohol, drugs or guns, condoms, etc., and many other things. Perhaps parental controls are not good enough? That's where the regulation could genuinely help - require ch…

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