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Opening up 'Zero-Knowledge Proof' technology to promote privacy in age assurance

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Re: Opening up 'Zero-Knowledge Proof' technology to promote privacy in age assurance

#31

Post by Groxx »

Epa095 wrote: post #27
Groxx wrote: post #13

I've been trying to figure out how zero-knowledge stuff would work in practice for age verification, where "when issued" (or extremely coarse, like what year), "to whom", and "where it's used" are hidden from everyone except the individual holding the proof (since that's the gold standard, and the only one worth accepting). I get that ZK techniques work, and reveal "nothing". That's useful. But if they reveal nothing…

Idk if this scheme is zero knowledge, but what's wrong with it? : - you enter ph and must age-verify. It says 'your secret: "capable peanut", enter age proof below'. - you go to age-knower (e.g bank or government page). You provide the secret phrase, and you get back a cryptographically signed json with the secret phrase, a claim 'above18', and a field stating who attested for the age (e.g government or bank or whoev…

Yes, that allows collusion. Which has historically happened quite regularly any time money or politics are involved, which means we should not accept that strategy.

For some isolated scenarios, that collusion risk may be completely fine. But not for something that is poised to control access to the internet as a whole, or in any way relates to maintaining safe free speech on the dominant public platform for doing so (the internet). People need protection from their government (present and future), or it's not a "right", it's just temporary retroactively-revokable permission.

Re: Opening up 'Zero-Knowledge Proof' technology to promote privacy in age assurance

#32

Post by coppsilgold »

consumer451 wrote: post #30
coppsilgold wrote: post #28

Unfortunately ZKP's aren't magic. When not doing privacy oriented cryptocurrency ( cough money laundering cough ) with ZKP's, if you really want private verification you are in a position where a single actor can authenticate the entire world and no one will know it happened. And to prevent it you assemble the pieces necessary to deanonymize anyone. Make no mistake. ZKP age verification, as proposed, will just requir…

Assuming that perfect is the enemy of good, this is still better than all the proposed alternatives, isn't it?

With ZKP age verification, services will not be able to track you without help from the CA. The CA will not be able to track you without help from the services. Both will contain the necessary information in their databases that when combined deanonymize you. The CA is the central authority/certificate authority.

So you should assume the government can track you, because you should assume both will be streaming those identifiers to it.

Re: Opening up 'Zero-Knowledge Proof' technology to promote privacy in age assurance

#33

Post by protocolture »

Avicebron wrote: post #12
protocolture wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Dont do age assurance, ever" Done.

Ok, they have ignored that. I did my part and sent an email. Now what?

Violent revolution I guess. Genuinely what are the other options?

I made a formal submission to the Australian Government in the very small consulting window they held for the Access and Assistance bill. Pleading with them to consider simply not introducing the law, as there was no justification for it at all. Google also made a submission against the bill, as did many large local and overseas corporations.

The government went ahead anyway.

What are the chances of me swinging any government when Google et al are on the other side, determined to provide privacy and anonymity destroying products to bolster their bottom line?

Probably worth mentioning that the Access and Assistance bill permits the Australian government to secretly (even just verbally) compel anyone building age assurance technology to secretly backdoor it to collect metadata, or any other information they choose. There's no level of safety from the government one can achieve with any app. If they resist they go straight to the Australian version of a secret national security court. The bill doesn't even make it clear whether briefing their solicitor about the request is legal. It doesn't matter how good the crypto is if the app is recording details outside of that. Its all just theatre at this point. There's no safe app, so we should completely resist all attempts to do things the government could restrict, leak or misuse.

I dont see how this is even slightly contentious in the year of our lord two thousand and twenty six, after decades of leaks affirming governments do this stuff, decades of governments and corporations dangerously failing their citizens privacy, when a particular government is hell bent on using all the personal data it can hoover up to persecute migrants and refugees. How are people blindly monofocusing on the crypto while trusting everything else?

Re: Opening up 'Zero-Knowledge Proof' technology to promote privacy in age assurance

#34

Post by echelon »

doginasuit wrote: post #19
dadoum wrote: post #10

Still, I don't want to gate people based on age. Parents should at least be able to overwrite the age of their child, maybe selectively allow bypasses. My experience with a computer would have been completely different if I was blocked from half of the internet. Especially when I see which kind of content gets blocked.

As a millennial-aged person I saw a fair amount of content I would not want the young people in my life to see, but it's probably not nearly as harmful as the non-age gated content that they will still have access to. There is a lot creepy youtube and tiktok content that isn't off limits but still unhealthy and my younger relatives are fascinated by it.

We need to stop this helicopter civilization bullshit.

We're building 1984 to protect from god knows what imaginary harms.

Stop putting plastic wrap around people's freedoms, liberty, and right to privacy.

Re: Opening up 'Zero-Knowledge Proof' technology to promote privacy in age assurance

#35

Post by _alternator_ »

doginasuit wrote: post #22
slwvx wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

zero-knowledge proofs are a well-known tool in cryptography [1]. All Google is sharing is the library to implement it. Google would not have access to the information any more than they have access to the bank info of people who use Android or Gmail. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-knowledge_proof

It's my understanding that they are sharing the library but they will also be involved as a facilitator, at least to the extent that people use their identity wallet service. It also seems like they will have access to who you are sharing information with, which seems like the most valuable information for a company in their position, with nothing but a pinky promise that it will not be tracked. Let me know if any of…

I don't know the technical details of this ZKP library, but there is no technical reason that I'm aware of that the ID provider would need to know who you are sharing with. Not to say Google didn't build it this way for business reasons.

Re: Opening up 'Zero-Knowledge Proof' technology to promote privacy in age assurance

#36

Post by countcol »

echelon wrote: post #34
doginasuit wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a millennial-aged person I saw a fair amount of content I would not want the young people in my life to see, but it's probably not nearly as harmful as the non-age gated content that they will still have access to. There is a lot creepy youtube and tiktok content that isn't off limits but still unhealthy and my younger relatives are fascinated by it.

We need to stop this helicopter civilization bullshit. We're building 1984 to protect from god knows what imaginary harms. Stop putting plastic wrap around people's freedoms, liberty, and right to privacy.

[flagged]

Re: Opening up 'Zero-Knowledge Proof' technology to promote privacy in age assurance

#37

Post by countcol »

Aurornis wrote: post #23
Groxx wrote: post #13

I've been trying to figure out how zero-knowledge stuff would work in practice for age verification, where "when issued" (or extremely coarse, like what year), "to whom", and "where it's used" are hidden from everyone except the individual holding the proof (since that's the gold standard, and the only one worth accepting). I get that ZK techniques work, and reveal "nothing". That's useful. But if they reveal nothing…

> But if they reveal nothing, isn't it wide open for abuse? Couldn't one over-18-person's proof become everyone's proof, because they can't tell it's the same proof, and the issuer can't tell where or how often the proof is being used? Yep! This is why the concept of zero knowledge age gating is such a trap for technically minded people. They imagine receiving a private cryptographic object that can be used to anonym…

You can use a Linux… if it’s a Android

:(

Re: Opening up 'Zero-Knowledge Proof' technology to promote privacy in age assurance

#38

Post by echelon »

countcol wrote: post #36
echelon wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need to stop this helicopter civilization bullshit. We're building 1984 to protect from god knows what imaginary harms. Stop putting plastic wrap around people's freedoms, liberty, and right to privacy.

[flagged]

I'd seen all the shock websites by age 12. Kids love to prank each other.

None of this is a real harm. The real harms are the government being able to put a muzzle on speech, track who says what, and begin to cordon off areas of thought and expression.

You might think it's a win that this is happening, but you won't be the one in charge and you won't have a say how it's used against you.

Re: Opening up 'Zero-Knowledge Proof' technology to promote privacy in age assurance

#39

Post by consumer451 »

coppsilgold wrote: post #32
consumer451 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Assuming that perfect is the enemy of good, this is still better than all the proposed alternatives, isn't it?

With ZKP age verification, services will not be able to track you without help from the CA. The CA will not be able to track you without help from the services. Both will contain the necessary information in their databases that when combined deanonymize you. The CA is the central authority/certificate authority. So you should assume the government can track you, because you should assume both will be streaming those…

Yes, there is one party that can track you, which in some countries is still slightly trusted.

Ideally, no age verification would be required or proposed. However, if it is, this implementation should be the base minimum, should it not?

This is a gazillion percent better than a foreign corporation being in charge, isn't it?

Re: Opening up 'Zero-Knowledge Proof' technology to promote privacy in age assurance

#40

Post by smilekzs »

countcol wrote: post #36
echelon wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need to stop this helicopter civilization bullshit. We're building 1984 to protect from god knows what imaginary harms. Stop putting plastic wrap around people's freedoms, liberty, and right to privacy.

[flagged]

The legal guardian is responsible for gatekeeping what their minor sees or does not see.
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