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Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs
151–160 of 301 posts
Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs
#152There's tension between this law and the 14th, 5th and 1st amendments.
Due process doctrine from the 5th and 14th establish unconstitutional vagueness. A law cannot be so vague as to be impossible to comply with. This law requires websites to enforce a ban based on information they don't have access to. Without explain how they might possibly achieve that aim, it can be considered unconstitutionally vague.
The 1st amendment requires that a law restricting free speech use the least restrictive means possible to achieve it's aim. Due to the vagueness of how to comply on a technical level, the only possible way to comply would be to require global identity verification based on Utah's standards. I don't think that would pass a least restrictive means test.
Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs
#153Earlier quoted context omitted.
Utah hosts I think the biggest nsa data center. Honestly, I would like my ISP to block all traffic to and from Utah if this law passes. I can't think of anything I want or need that involves that state.
Without it being good or bad (long term, second order effects), I do think all of these (proposed) laws and where we are heading will balkanize the internet. Alternative tech may sound appealing to the tinkerers, and they may keep certain important channels alive (think radio amateurs... they know this game) but for the masses? I already happily block entire countries or regions to my VPS as there is zero benefit for…
I wish there was an easy way to geolocate ip addresses by us state. It's not too hard to block everything from say russia.
Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs
#154I understand the need for age verification. And better way to do this is have all device way to communicate the age set by parents to websites. This is just one of the way. “The Anxious Generation”- Jonathan Haidt put it across. Rey well. It’s import at this day and age to check age online. Banning VPN is not the way. Even ChargePoint app does not work with vpn on I am baffled.
There is no need for age verification: ban all mobile devices and access to anything vaguely "social" (and possibly porn) for everyone under 18. Place heavy fines. But it requires more guts than governments have. They get lobbied, coerced by corruptible friends, and threatened, and we end up with the worst of all outcomes: addicted children without attention and lack of privacy.
Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs
#155Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's all coming from Meta: https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/reddit-user-uncovers-beh... Big tech wants regulatory capture.
There is no evidence it is actually coming from Meta. The Reddit researcher the article cites generated their entire "analysis" in three days using Claude: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47659552 Their website also added this page since I posted that comment: https://web.archive.org/web/20260411112604/https://tboteproj... where they claim their website is under "surveillance" because it got a few thousand reque…
The way that Reddit "researcher" had Claude bang out a GitHub repo in a couple days and single-handedly established the narrative throughout the internet is scary.
When it was released I read a few of the reports in this repo and they didn't even support the claims made. Claude was admitting it couldn't find the evidence.
It's terrifying how easily this misinfo operation established itself as fact on websites where users view themselves as being more informed than average on these topics, like Hacker News.
Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs
#156Earlier quoted context omitted.
> There is no evidence it is actually coming from Meta My personal view that social media should be age gated is caused by Meta. But broadly, polling shows a commanding majority (60+ percent) of Americans believe in restrictions for under 14s.
Is there broad support for digital ID, age verification, etc? Or is it a broad sentiment that kids shouldn’t be on social media. Everyone I know agrees with latter but almost no one supports the former.
The parent commenter is conflating two things. Your right, there can be broad general sentiment that "kids probably shouldn't on social media, or better framed, social media in it's current iteration isn't healthy for people especially kids" but that doesn't imply people are asking for intrusive surveillance or to be monitored at all times when they are online.
Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs
#157Related EFF coverage:
Utah's New Law Targeting VPNs Goes into Effect Next Week
Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs
#158Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is there broad support for digital ID, age verification, etc? Or is it a broad sentiment that kids shouldn’t be on social media. Everyone I know agrees with latter but almost no one supports the former.
The parent commenter is conflating two things. Your right, there can be broad general sentiment that "kids probably shouldn't on social media, or better framed, social media in it's current iteration isn't healthy for people especially kids" but that doesn't imply people are asking for intrusive surveillance or to be monitored at all times when they are online.
Yes, i was asking which one the polling they were citing was about.
Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs
#159I am completely baffled by this wave of new laws and proposals... they feel dystopic and can seemingly only lead to brutal restrictions on the internet. What will we end up with? Only attested modems / endpoints in the home? With DPI? And a government issued smartcard to use it? It comes across as if this is what some legislators are actually after... they must have some technical advisors who can explain to them tha…
The only baffling thing is taht it took this long. In the physical world, we can limit the types of businesses. We can limit access to them. Casinos, adult entertainment, drinking establishments, etc require efort to go to and there's enforcement (not always effective, obviously) to keep, say, minors out. The Internet has broken down that structure such that there are no limitations and, like it or not, that's really…
> The Internet has broken down that structure such that there are no limitations and, like it or not, that's really harmful. Widespread access to sports betting and crypto gambling [...]
Your analysis disregards the evidence of several decades in which the Internet existed, but gambling was still broadly illegal and getting around those laws was anything but trivial (since blocking financial flows is, or at least used to be, pretty effective).
Now it's explicitly legal in many states, and I think this can explain for the recent boom much more than the availability of offshore on-chain betting.
> IMHO private companies shouldn't be trusted with verifying IDs. The government should do that because, you know, they're the ones who issued the IDs.
This requires trusting the government in the first place. Easy in some places; not so much in others.
Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs
#160I am completely baffled by this wave of new laws and proposals... they feel dystopic and can seemingly only lead to brutal restrictions on the internet. What will we end up with? Only attested modems / endpoints in the home? With DPI? And a government issued smartcard to use it? It comes across as if this is what some legislators are actually after... they must have some technical advisors who can explain to them tha…
I'm confused where all of this censorship is originating from. What wave of efforts is culminating? I can't really explain this from any movement I can see.
> What wave of efforts is culminating? I can't really explain this from any movement I can see.
Look at any thread about social media, TikTok, smartphones, or porn sites on Hacker News: They are instantly filled with comments claiming that the internet is to blame for all of society's ills with younger generations. The HN threads fill with comments proposing that we ban children from having smartphones until they're 16 or 18 and similar ideas. Abstract ideas about banning kids from social media or porn sites are weirdly very popular even here, mostly from people who haven't thought about what that would mean for privacy for everyone.
These ideas have become pervasive, even inside tech communities. It was so easy to blame social media and the internet for everything for years, and now lawmakers are riding that wave for political points. It's "think of the children" built on top of the current moral panics.