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Age verification tech could put children at greater risk, says think tank

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Re: Age verification tech could put children at greater risk, says think tank

#181

Post by Dylan16807 »

Emanation wrote: post #96
pjc50 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect they don't really; once you give a teen a smartphone your control over what websites they visit ends. (you will reply "don't do that then") But also: cutting one kid off from social networks ostracises them. The parents recognize it's a collective action problem.

So does grounding a kid, so I guess parents shouldn't do that either unless all parents collectively agree to ground their children.

Are you arguing that if something is fine as a deliberate punishment it's fine full-time? If that's not your point I can't figure it out.

Re: Age verification tech could put children at greater risk, says think tank

#182

Post by pmyteh »

jmyeet wrote: post #39

I believe we could solve a lot of these problems by making it illegal to advertise to minors. I'm reminded of the settlement with Facebook where it was illegally allowing racial targeting in ads for housing, which is illegal [1]. If platforms were suddenly liable for allowing or failing to stop the targeting of minors, they'd suddenly have a lot of incentive to figure this out. The beauty of this is that they already…

You're right to be concerned about thinktank-washing, but FIPR themselves are fine: one of the academic:policy bridge groups rather than an astroturfing organisation funneling dark money.

I don't always agree with their stuff, but they're good faith actors.

Re: Age verification tech could put children at greater risk, says think tank

#183

Post by pmyteh »

trumpdong wrote: post #74
jmyeet wrote: post #39

I believe we could solve a lot of these problems by making it illegal to advertise to minors. I'm reminded of the settlement with Facebook where it was illegally allowing racial targeting in ads for housing, which is illegal [1]. If platforms were suddenly liable for allowing or failing to stop the targeting of minors, they'd suddenly have a lot of incentive to figure this out. The beauty of this is that they already…

How would you know if someone was a minor? Facebook knows even if you don't tell them, but I don't. Would it be combined with the California-style OS age header?

I suspect the easiest way would be to ban advertising things designed to appeal to children, which is content-based rather than reader-based and cuts with the grain of some previous restrictions in the UK (no junk food ads on children's TV, for example, no tobacco add at all). It's intent-based and so less gamable, and would tank the value proposition of British kids online, if enforced, by lowering the CPM rate.

I'm not convinced it's a good idea, FWIW, but it would be a lot less crappy than age verification.

Re: Age verification tech could put children at greater risk, says think tank

#184

Post by selicos »

amai wrote: post #177

Why do we need age verification tech in the first place? We also don‘t have speed verification tech on the streets, but we have speed limits everywhere.

Speed cameras, police with radar/etc, self reporting via insurance apps, controlled by GPS or speed limits in vehicles, etc

The tech is there but not applied equally. Regulations could limit every car to 70mph, or the (US) state to state max highway speeds. eBikes are sort of already doing this with categories based on max speed, in some states.

Then like speed limits and (emissions) regulations, people would find ways to bypass them. Rolling coal is one example. Electric 'bikes' that are basically mopeds or mini motorcycles don't require registration or licensing in many places, or at least don't enforce it.

How much freedom is the general populace willing to stomach? These age verification laws apply to everyone but tend to only impact nonvoters (age 17 and under). People are generally apathetic (especially US voters) and may comply with the easy option before fighting and preventing any "foot in the door" for this sort of policy.

I can't use Instagram due to the ratio of ads and sponsored posts yet apparently millions are fine with it. If they can send their ID and likeness to Meta once and continue to scroll, how much will they care?

Adding layers for accountability is a good idea. It needs to start with social media itself, including preventing misinformation and disclosing algorithm/behavior nudges designed to suck people in.

Re: Age verification tech could put children at greater risk, says think tank

#185

Post by delusional »

zdragnar wrote: post #110
delusional wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which part is untrue?

> and will allow you to make a call from their phone. People can be wildly reluctant to just hand over a thousand or two dollars worth of equipment to a teenager in a busy street and hope they don't run off with it. Smartphone theft is still a thing.

What hellscape are you living in? I have never had anyone try to trick me like that. I'm not saying theft doesn't exist in Denmark, but it is not something I have ever considered when helping a person out.

Re: Age verification tech could put children at greater risk, says think tank

#186

Post by selicos »

monooso wrote: post #56

Disclaimer: not a parent, as will soon become apparent. Several people have made the argument that individual parents can't simply cut their children off from social media, as said offspring may be ostracised (or simply look at their friends' phones, assuming they still have any). That argument makes sense to me, to an extent. What I don't quite understand is the conclusion that this leaves parents with only two (equ…

US voters are defined by their apathy. Collective action is difficult even on areas most American's agree on due to shades of grey and implementation differences.

It may be analogous to vaccine adoption, with requirements in place for all (with some exceptions).

Who sets and applies the exceptions? A state or federal agency that runs afoul of free speech issues? An AMA type public board for social media use, quickly captured by the industry they serve to regulate? Parents themselves via opt out paperwork or ignoring the regulations?

I want to see more options debated or proposed for this sort of management, starting with right to privacy and your data, harsh punishment for promoting misinformation, and disclosure of algorithms/etc on what your feed includes.

Make all fines a flat % of revenue or an otherwise real amount to companies like Meta, not just a cost of business. Maybe pay users when their data is used/sold/etc, or otherwise increase the cost of what are basically information dragnets for advertising and manipulation.

Re: Age verification tech could put children at greater risk, says think tank

#187

Post by esseph »

wizzwizz4 wrote: post #133
esseph wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Because of the ostracization problem. Kids are ruthless, and failure to conform is swiftly punished. Shocker, but those are probably not the people you are going to give a shit about after you leave school.

Shocker, but a lot of psychological damage can be done before you leave school. Do children really not have value, except as far as they become adults?

> Do children really not have value, except as far as they become adults?

Of course they do, which is why any sane (imo) parent wouldn't let their child on social media to begin with. Basically feeding your child's developing brain into the dopamine farm, along with the "it's on the internet forever" tax.

Social media is a cancer, not some bizare tool for their social or economic wellbeing or general happiness.

Re: Age verification tech could put children at greater risk, says think tank

#188

Post by thinkingtoilet »

dghlsakjg wrote: post #116
thinkingtoilet wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't do it then. :) It's not hard. If they need to be contacted get them a dumb phone. And yes, my kids will miss out. They will miss out on their attention span being destroyed, their ability to critically think destroyed, body issues, radicalization, horrible influences, etc... My children will miss out on all that and I'm very glad that will be the case. I'm not sure why other parents are rushing to destroy their…

Or they’ll be mildly resourceful and pickup a cheap Walmart phone, or a friend’s old phone and learn that they can’t be open with you. I ran a summer camp for teenagers. They know how to get around that stuff if they want. They know how to hide it from their parents to keep access. You’ll do far better to explain how these things are harmful, and help them make decisions that are healthy. Below a certain age I’m sure…

This is always the response. I'm not an idiot. I understand kids will do things to break the rules. The point is, it won't be something they have access to constantly. If they see a phone at a friend's house that's fine.

>You’ll do far better to explain how these things are harmful, and help them make decisions that are healthy.

Yes. And the healthy decision is to not have a phone. That's like saying I should let my kid eat ice cream for dinner every night but talk to them about how it's better to eat healthy. I'm a parent. It's my job to make some decisions for my children.

Re: Age verification tech could put children at greater risk, says think tank

#189

Post by its-summertime »

hnlmorg wrote: post #25
its-summertime wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is an unfortunate lack of unity for such things. It would work if governments made it easily understandable how to categorize content, but the vast majority is handled by closed boards of people, so no "case law" exists for the difficult edge cases. Additionally, some jurisdictions have laws based around religious and cultural values which are not immediately obvious, I'm sure many webmasters would be happy to…

> There is an unfortunate lack of unity for such things. It would work if governments made it easily understandable how to categorize content, but the vast majority is handled by closed boards of people, so no "case law" exists for the difficult edge cases. Who cares if some sites get it wrong? It would still be a better scenario than we have now where people either announce who they are, or they hunt for some other…

Because liability is likely to be weird in a lot of jurisdictions. I could see incorrectly tagging content as having bigger ramifications than not tagging content.

How does one know what to tag their content as, if they do not know what tags are used by the other party? A standard where every party makes up their own rules as they go along, doesn't exactly work well.

Re: Age verification tech could put children at greater risk, says think tank

#190

Post by [deleted] »

fc417fc802 wrote: post #13
Scaled wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FYI for adult content, there's a standard called RTA-Label that already integrates with all parental controls and is already deployed on all major adult sites.

Yes but isn't that limited to only tagging adult sites? That's great and it works but it only applies to a small piece of the stated problem. It seems to be largely social media that's driving popular support for this latest go round. RTA is an excellent demonstration that a self categorization system can be expected to work provided it's standardized and service operators make use of it. What's missing then is granu…

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