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A new California law says all operating systems need to have age verification

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Re: A new California law says all operating systems need to have age verification

#131

Post by collingreen »

anonym29 wrote: post #99
johnea wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm, again, glad to run linux. The distro I run has no affiliated online "account" at all, and I would expect this exempts it from the requirement. I'm no democrat, although I'm sure as hell no republican, and as a resident of the state, I'm also a routine critic of the California state government. I agree that a lot of their activities are indeed, performance art in nature. However I do agree with the identification…

It's about as easy to restrict the proliferation of firearms and ammunition as it is to restrict the proliferation of open source software. Anyone can make functional firearms out of supplies from any hardware store, this is true regardless of how many laws you pass. Look at the weapon that was used to assassinate Shinzo Abe. That was manufactured and used in a country with gun control laws that basically make Califo…

It's a logical mistake to say that because an extremely motivated person can still cause harm somehow that implies no regulation or policy can have any positive impact anywhere.

I don't have a stance here on what "the right" policies around gun control are but it is clearly a much wider field than just a preplanned assassination with diy parts.

A non-exhaustive list of a few very different scenarios that are all involved with anything touching or rejecting gun control:

- highly motivated, DIY-in-the-basement assassination plots like you mentioned - hunting for food - hunting for fun - wilderness safety - organized crime and gang related violence - mass shootings at things like concerts, sporting events, colleges. Sub point of mass shootings at schools where the law requires children to be. - gun violence involved with suddenly escalating impromptu violence like road rage and street/bar fights - systematic intimidation / domestic terrorism of particular groups or areas - gun related suicides

All of these are very very different. None of them have perfect answers but that doesn't make thinking about it "an act of banging your own head against the cold, hard wall of reality" nor does it make anyone interested in working on some of these problems naive or stupid like you imply.

If you're being earnest or maybe jaded, I'd say dont give up hope and don't let perfect be the enemy of good.

If you're just being a dick then so be it, maybe someone else gets something out of this comment.

Re: A new California law says all operating systems need to have age verification

#132

Post by dontblokmebro70 »

AceJohnny2 wrote: post #87
fangpenlin wrote: post #67

There's an obvious theme with lawmakers in California—they pass laws to regulate things they have zero clue about, add them to their achievement page, cheer for themselves, and declare, "There! I've made the world a better place." There are just too many examples. For instance: - Microstamping requirements for guns—printing a unique barcode on every bullet casing (Glock gen3 cannot be retired, thus, the auto-mode swi…

> There's an obvious theme with lawmakers in California You can remove the in California

[dead]

Re: A new California law says all operating systems need to have age verification

#133

Post by bo1024 »

cjs_ac wrote: post #18

Ignoring all the tedious 'no, you're a bad person for having different priorities and beliefs to me' comments that this will inevitably inspire, I have to ask: why does the operating system need to be involved in this? The intended target of the regulation seems to be app stores. Someone has fallen victim to Politician's Logic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vidzkYnaf6Y

I don't know, but arguably the OS version is better for privacy, as each app can just trust the signal sent by the OS instead of collecting a bunch of personal/biometric data.

Re: A new California law says all operating systems need to have age verification

#134

Post by SoftTalker »

throw03172019 wrote: post #42

Are lawmakers bored? Who is asking for this? Not the tax paying citizens.

Parents who are fed up with social media and tech companies taking no social responsibility.

These companies have fewer ethics than a minimum-wage liquor store clerk when it comes to caring about the age of their users.

Re: A new California law says all operating systems need to have age verification

#135

Post by CWuestefeld »

It's not stated here, but is it implied that app platforms that, themselves, have an "app store", would be required to read this datum and pass it to their app store?

For example, I've got a map application on my phone that lets me download maps, widgets, POI lists, etc. from their app store. It seems like enabling that age signal through this exchange is exactly what the politicians are looking for.

Re: A new California law says all operating systems need to have age verification

#136

Post by why_at »

davorak wrote: post #39
cjs_ac wrote: post #18

Ignoring all the tedious 'no, you're a bad person for having different priorities and beliefs to me' comments that this will inevitably inspire, I have to ask: why does the operating system need to be involved in this? The intended target of the regulation seems to be app stores. Someone has fallen victim to Politician's Logic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vidzkYnaf6Y

> why does the operating system need to be involved in this? The goal in my mind is to have an account a parent can setup for their child. This account is set up by an account with more permissions access. Then the app store depends on that OS level feature to tell what apps are can be offered to the account. Let say the the age questions happen when you install the app store. That means if you can install the app st…

I agree. The headline says "all operating systems, including Linux, need to have some form of age verification at account setup", which is pretty inaccurate.

It's just asking for some OS feature to report age. There's no verification during account setup. The app store or whatever will be doing verification by asking the OS. Still dumb to write this into law, but maybe not a bad way to handle the whole age verification panic we're going through.

Re: A new California law says all operating systems need to have age verification

#137

Post by packetlost »

cjs_ac wrote: post #18

Ignoring all the tedious 'no, you're a bad person for having different priorities and beliefs to me' comments that this will inevitably inspire, I have to ask: why does the operating system need to be involved in this? The intended target of the regulation seems to be app stores. Someone has fallen victim to Politician's Logic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vidzkYnaf6Y

Because it's the lowest common denominator between the user and every online interaction. The bill basically says provide a date-of-birth as metadata to accounts and provide an API to query the age bracket, not even the age, of the user to applications. It's a privacy-aware, mostly reasonable approach that shifts responsibility to the owner/administrator of a device to enforce it. It's basically just mandating parental controls.

Re: A new California law says all operating systems need to have age verification

#138

Post by aspbee555 »

Animats wrote: post #119

It's not clear that this applies where the "operating system provider" does not have "accounts". Linux should be OK, but "Ubuntu One" might have problems. It's a good reason not to put cloud dependencies into things.

this is why I am building a communications software that has no concept of accounts, devices can connect and keys are generated on device and blind to relaying/directing server/network. people can only connect directly with other people/devices. there is no concept of lists of people/devices to connect to, you need to know someone/have access to the device to connect.

no accounts to compromise. no passwords to remember. end point devices control their connectivity. no vpn needed to connect, no intermediary to see all traffic and peer traffic is specifically what is needed/allowed/requested, not a wide open network connection/accounts to be compromised

Re: A new California law says all operating systems need to have age verification

#139

Post by whynotmaybe »

jrmg wrote: post #12

The actual bill: https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtm... Bill text (it’s longer, but the rest is mostly definitions of the terms used here): 1798.501. (a) An operating system provider shall do all of the following: (1) Provide an accessible interface at account setup that requires an account holder to indicate the birth date, age, or both, of the user of that device for the purpose of providin…

How does that apply to windows server with active directory for a school ?

Does that mean that the admin will have to manage dob of every student when creating accounts ?

> A developer shall not willfully disregard internal clear and convincing information otherwise available to the developer that indicates that a user’s age is different than the age bracket data indicated by a signal provided by an operating system provider or a covered application store.

>If a developer has internal clear and convincing information that a user’s age is different than the age indicated by a signal received pursuant to this title, the developer shall use that information as the primary indicator of the user’s age.

So, I have a button "I'm older than 18" on my app but the signal is "under 13", I can decide that the user is older than 18 ?

Re: A new California law says all operating systems need to have age verification

#140

Post by autoexec »

bo1024 wrote: post #133
cjs_ac wrote: post #18

Ignoring all the tedious 'no, you're a bad person for having different priorities and beliefs to me' comments that this will inevitably inspire, I have to ask: why does the operating system need to be involved in this? The intended target of the regulation seems to be app stores. Someone has fallen victim to Politician's Logic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vidzkYnaf6Y

I don't know, but arguably the OS version is better for privacy, as each app can just trust the signal sent by the OS instead of collecting a bunch of personal/biometric data.

until they decide that the OS now needs to collect a bunch of personal/biometric data to avoid people lying about their age or tricking the OS into sending a different signal than the OS should.
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