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UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

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131–140 of 213 posts

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#131

I don't get why the device changes the blame logic. If child-services knew a parent was constantly watching/leaving around adult-content near children, that'd be considered the parents fault. If a parent lets a kid watch anything they want on TV and the kid watches adult content, it's the parents fault. But if the parent gives the child a phone, and doesn't manage what apps they use or content they watch, now it's th…

I could just as easily turn this argument around: If my younger self, went into a store to buy a bottle of Vodka, before I came of age at 18 here in Germany, it wasn't my parents fault. It was the shop that did not check my license that was liable. If they sold me beer before I was 16, same situation. Analogous for cigarettes. Or me trying to enter an amusement arcade (with monetary gains possible, not just pinball l…

the problem is that devices are meant to be tools. They do not provide access to services, but you use them to access them. Limiting my devices' ability to do what i ask of them is more like geofencing my shoes, because you might use them to walk to the casino.

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#132
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How? Parents would give smartphones to their kids.

That's like saying parents would give meth to their kids. Make the crime equivalent and you'll find they won't, or if they do, they won't have their kids for long. Parents are obviously far too stupid to do what's in their children's best interests re social media and smart phones. That plus the general indifference most parents have to this kind of thing mandates state interference. Banning social media for them spe…

> Parents are obviously far too stupid to do what's in their children's best interests re social media and smart phones.

Then you'll need to address elections too, banning such parents from voting - or standing.

> I think desktop computer use under some level of parental supervision is fine

So... ban laptops, tablets .. and any other device under 10kg?

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does big tech help the parents? Can I set the age of the child in the phone user account and then the browser will report the age to the websites and the nice websites will aknowledge it and deny minors to watch adult content? No big tech and browser makers did not put their hurds of developers to handle this and forced the governments to try more retarded solutions. This big OSes should have a super easy activation…

You can block the entire internet and whitelist specific domains. There's multiple ways of doing this, from router parental controls, specific OS tools in iOS/Android, Windows, as well as apps specific to it, and all it takes is for a parent to care enough to make a simple Google or Youtube search and learn if they don't know, and don't even know to know that they should care in the first place. The failure here is t…

Does router setting spply when the child is at school and using data? I do not think so. So you need to have the averager parent setup DNS records and probably pay some subscription to soem people doing the filtering?

It is not easy, if there was just a simple toggle and iOS/Android would ask the parent what kind of religious extremist or prude they are and then do the filtering then sure, but you want a parent to know what a router is, or DNS, or buy some subscriptions for some big tech app?

I agree that parents should do the filtering, but I think big tech should cooperate here, for example I could allow my young child on a PlayStation since Sony did ask the age of the account user and did apply filters in the store and chats.

But what is your objection? Is it really, REALY to much to ask for the Os to ask the birthday of the account user and then the browser to set the appropriate age range flag in the requests? Then the websites can deny the requests instead of the "Are you over 18" popup? Is that too expensive? too dificult? is it too communist?

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#134

I don't get why the device changes the blame logic. If child-services knew a parent was constantly watching/leaving around adult-content near children, that'd be considered the parents fault. If a parent lets a kid watch anything they want on TV and the kid watches adult content, it's the parents fault. But if the parent gives the child a phone, and doesn't manage what apps they use or content they watch, now it's th…

I could just as easily turn this argument around: If my younger self, went into a store to buy a bottle of Vodka, before I came of age at 18 here in Germany, it wasn't my parents fault. It was the shop that did not check my license that was liable. If they sold me beer before I was 16, same situation. Analogous for cigarettes. Or me trying to enter an amusement arcade (with monetary gains possible, not just pinball l…

That's a really fair point. I suppose it's reasonable to point out that adults do have to provide ID quite often to buy things, but it's skipped so often because people can just look at us so we don't "feel" it. I think my problem comes from how I don't believe my cornershop records my ID when they see it, whilst I imagine these services would.

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It does not require either party to have the other's ID. Sure but that's literally not my point. It's still an interception because the govt is still decided who can communicate (essentially) or not. You cannot communicate with a vps provider if they don't have your ID and this condition being forced as a requirement otherwise the UK govt.s gonna jail and sue into literal millions is much akin to an interception in…

It literally is your point "enforcing a condition for one party to have Id of other for age verification etc". As for the provider , there is not prhibition on communicating with him, with or without ID. Just on him providing service to other than verifed adults.

> As for the provider, there is not prhibition on communicating with him, with or without ID. Just on him providing service to other than verifed adults.

Oh okay yea I don't mean that exactly but from my original comment what I meant was that the service of VPN is still essentially just a communication layer of sorts between two devices where a middle man can sit technically.

I was referring to this as still a communication creating a network between these two vis a vis VPN

And they are having restrictions on VPN's, my point of fear in this context is that suppose I host anything between two computers, technically its still a VPN (think a proxy or even a VPS or even cf tunnels alternative or heck even my self hosted tmate)

My point is that they are all still technically VPN's and this rule can still apply. I don't think that they can refer to VPN as wireguard or something as we imagine and this gives immense power to them

It's absolutely scary to say the least.

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

not with a non-governmental agency doing the exchange. All they would see are tokens going out. You would need the non-governmental agency to share the urls with the government agency for the activity to be tied directly which would undermine the entire purpose of that architecture.

> You would need the non-governmental agency to share the urls with the government agency for the activity to be tied directly which would undermine the entire purpose of that architecture. Which would absolutely would happen. The authorities will ask the non-gov agency for the details and they will be provided.

that's like stating that there's no value in creating a financial regulator to set interest rates because the government will just tell them to set them to whatever they demand.

There's still value in it.

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's possible? You could imagine some sort of certificate scheme where the govt issues a thing that says to a 3rd party "we certify this person is 18 but in a way that doesn't reveal who they are". You could also implement that in a way where, even if the 3rd party reports the details of an authorisation to the govt, the govt can't say who was involved in that auth. But in the latter case, the system is…

> The answer is to leave this shit to parents. See Australia. Many parents helped their children evade the ban. https://www.crikey.com.au/2025/12/04/social-media-ban-parent...

That should be the parent’s choice, no?

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#138
post #91

Has anyone told them teens would create accounts with foreign VPN services?

IP blacklisting will follow.

Just use Tor. And if they try to block that, use Snowflake bridges or v2ray like people in other censorious hellholes.

Make them shut it all down like Iran and show who they really are.

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It literally is your point "enforcing a condition for one party to have Id of other for age verification etc". As for the provider , there is not prhibition on communicating with him, with or without ID. Just on him providing service to other than verifed adults.

> As for the provider, there is not prhibition on communicating with him, with or without ID. Just on him providing service to other than verifed adults. Oh okay yea I don't mean that exactly but from my original comment what I meant was that the service of VPN is still essentially just a communication layer of sorts between two devices where a middle man can sit technically. I was referring to this as still a commun…

I think unfortunately you are right. The prohibition is wide - to head off evasion.

And probably they will need to widen further - to cover anything that can circumvent the social media block.

One more step towards Iran.

Scary indeed.

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#140
post #60

Every government in the world right now wants to get their hands on the controls and put their thumb on the scales here. Modern social media has proven to be effectively remote control for their citizens, nothing like this kind of power has never existed before and is absolutely irresistible to politicians. Expect them all to be laser focused on this until they're able to seize complete control, no matter how long it…

Counterpoint - Governments are attempting to wrest political control away from coordinated global corporate fascists.

Many of these governments are directly funded and directed by said corporate fascists. The opposition is hardly much better. There’s no good guys at the state level here.
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