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

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191–200 of 209 posts

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

#191
post #8
post #2

If you wanted to actually empower parents in helping their kids, you'd make sites emit some form of standard as TXT, SRV, /.well-known, whatever end points Then you'd make sure that the owner of the device has the ability to enable this, factoring in some tags for the category us-min-age:21:drinking gb-min-age:18:drinking au-min-age:16:socialmedia us-min-age:13:socialmedia Then I can use my existing parental controls…

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.

"All major adult sites" do not send RTA headers. e.g. last I checked, reddit does not. Nor does it segment adult content onto a separate domain or provide any other way to easily filter.

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

#192
post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

While I agree that the most popular social media systems have been engineered to be extremely harmful, and something I would seek to protect the children under my care from, this is unrelated to the comment I was responding to. "This won't feel important when you're an adult" is a really bad argument.

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

#194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is already reality in Finland. Want to schedule a doctor's appointment? Bank ID. Want to pay your taxes? Ban ID. Want to check your pension? Bank ID. The worst part of it is that a significant swathe of the population does not have access to bank ID, so they can't access these services anymore. It's a kafkaesque dystopia that is going places that I never thought would be possible.

I am Swedish so I know. BankID I like as it is now for authority stuff and I understand its need. The alternative would be everyone rolling their own auth and MFA, would be bad. Now imagine all social media tied to your BankID. This is their wet dream.

I don't agree with you wrt "the alternative". Things like scheduling a doctor's visit could be done without authentication. If some authentication is needed, it could be a traditional username/password setup (no MFA). Blocking part of the population from accessing basic services is just inhumane.

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

#195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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.

Any tourist area with a lot of people is going to be an area with potential for pick pockets and other theft of opportunity types. Even Vatican City has a crime rate often upwards or in excess of 1.5 per resident, and that's only what is officially recorded. Most people don't bother reporting a loss when there's no chance the police can do anything about it anyway.

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

#196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

It sounds like you have a plan!

Best of luck.

Sucks that we’re stuck as parents running an experiment on children where the only beneficiaries are corporations, and there is no correct answer.

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

#197
post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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.

While I agree that the most popular social media systems have been engineered to be extremely harmful, and something I would seek to protect the children under my care from, this is unrelated to the comment I was responding to. "This won't feel important when you're an adult" is a really bad argument.

Two of mine have come to adulthood in the past 7 years. They're fine. Didn't turn purple or become social outcasts.

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

#198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Any tourist area with a lot of people is going to be an area with potential for pick pockets and other theft of opportunity types. Even Vatican City has a crime rate often upwards or in excess of 1.5 per resident, and that's only what is officially recorded. Most people don't bother reporting a loss when there's no chance the police can do anything about it anyway.

The vatican city, having essentially no residents, would obviously be an outlier in any statistic measured against residents.

I take your point though, but I have to wonder who in their right mind would go to times square to ask to borrow a phone. Surely you'd go somewhere less busy.

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

#199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because of the ostracization problem. Kids are ruthless, and failure to conform is swiftly punished.

Parents need to weigh potential otracization against the cost of giving a smart device, which could be as high as ending their normal childhood development. Personally I think no phones until 16 is a good rule.

16 is steep, at 14 I was going around by bus a lot, having google maps to track when, what and where the bus is stopping would have made an enormous difference (this is a big city, changing route due to delays is possible). I wish I had it. (I had a normal phone, smartphones didn't exist yet)

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

#200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Parents need to weigh potential otracization against the cost of giving a smart device, which could be as high as ending their normal childhood development. Personally I think no phones until 16 is a good rule.

Parents need to weigh the potential bad effects of social media against the cost of otracization, which could be as high as ending their normal childhood development. Social development is very critical during school-age years.

Do you think kids are developing socially whilst on their phones?
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