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Australia begins enforcing world-first teen social media ban

reuters.com

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Re: Australia begins enforcing world-first teen social media ban

#261

Post by oblio »

gspencley wrote: post #254
feb012025 wrote: post #161

I feel like everyone in this thread is assuming this is a good faith move by Australia to help kids in school and with socialization. I think phones and social media are harmful, but I get the sense there's a political motive behind this. We've been hearing politicians complain for years that they're losing the youth when it comes to long-standing foreign policy positions, etc... And suddenly they ban social media. R…

In most legal jurisdictions that I know of, kids aren't legally allowed to be able to access to pornography either. How is that working out? The only way to even attempt to enforce these things is with government mandated age verification. Few people want that as it represents a massive violation of privacy and effectively makes anonymity on the Internet impossible.

It could be designed to be anonymous.

Government runs authentication service that has your personal details.

User creates account on platform Y, platform Y asks government service if your age is >18, service says y/n. Platform never finds out your personal details.

OAuth for age verification.

Re: Australia begins enforcing world-first teen social media ban

#262

Post by thfuran »

gspencley wrote: post #254
feb012025 wrote: post #161

I feel like everyone in this thread is assuming this is a good faith move by Australia to help kids in school and with socialization. I think phones and social media are harmful, but I get the sense there's a political motive behind this. We've been hearing politicians complain for years that they're losing the youth when it comes to long-standing foreign policy positions, etc... And suddenly they ban social media. R…

In most legal jurisdictions that I know of, kids aren't legally allowed to be able to access to pornography either. How is that working out? The only way to even attempt to enforce these things is with government mandated age verification. Few people want that as it represents a massive violation of privacy and effectively makes anonymity on the Internet impossible.

>The only way to even attempt to enforce these things is with government mandated age verification

Yes, that's what they did.

Re: Australia begins enforcing world-first teen social media ban

#263

Post by thfuran »

josho wrote: post #243
strangattractor wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Meta == Phillip Morris - This is a public health issue and will likely need to be treated like tobacco. Kids can't vote so I don't see the political motivation.

Good analogy. The solution, however, isn't prohibition or age restrictions; it's either regulating the algorithms or holding these companies responsible for the adverse outcomes their platforms contribute to. Safe harbor laws made sense when tech wasn't filtering/promoting content, now that they are influencing the material we see, these laws must no longer apply. This may mean adopting a modern equivalent to libel l…

I think the solution is banning accepting compensation for third party advertising.

Re: Australia begins enforcing world-first teen social media ban

#264

Post by MSFT_Edging »

Barrin92 wrote: post #209
feb012025 wrote: post #161

I feel like everyone in this thread is assuming this is a good faith move by Australia to help kids in school and with socialization. I think phones and social media are harmful, but I get the sense there's a political motive behind this. We've been hearing politicians complain for years that they're losing the youth when it comes to long-standing foreign policy positions, etc... And suddenly they ban social media. R…

>We've been hearing politicians complain for years that they're losing the youth when it comes to long-standing foreign policy positions, When Twitter added its location feature and it turned out that political accounts with millions of followers are run out of Pakistan or India you have to be crazy to still deny the scope of foreign influence that is exerted over social media. You see it with the rise in anti-semiti…

To be fair, "anti-semitism" claims have been 90% bad faith. Gaza was the internet's Vietnam.

We got just as mad at the internet letting our citizens at home see the brutality as we did with Jane Fonda and calling her "Hanoi Jane" after she traveled to Vietnam to bring light to the conflict(not a war).

I don't think there's any merit in being upset at dead children being reported because it messes with our national security goals. If the goals don't have public support with truthful reporting, they're basically illegitimate.

Re: Australia begins enforcing world-first teen social media ban

#266

Post by taejavu »

gen6acd60af wrote: post #244
artur44 wrote: post #191

Honestly, this feels like another case where the headline sounds bold, but the real impact will be minimal. Any age-based restriction ends up in the same place: platforms are forced to collect more data just to “prove” someone’s age. When the target group is teenagers, that’s basically a privacy disaster waiting to happen. From a technical perspective, this is impossible to enforce cleanly. Anyone with even basic int…

Please don't do this here. https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46208058

What, because they used a single em—dash?

Re: Australia begins enforcing world-first teen social media ban

#267

Post by yfw »

Sevrene wrote: post #215
feb012025 wrote: post #161

I feel like everyone in this thread is assuming this is a good faith move by Australia to help kids in school and with socialization. I think phones and social media are harmful, but I get the sense there's a political motive behind this. We've been hearing politicians complain for years that they're losing the youth when it comes to long-standing foreign policy positions, etc... And suddenly they ban social media. R…

I don't think we should normalise children on platforms where the content contains political agitation, sexual and violent content, crypto and fintech scams, etc. Especially when this content is packaged up to them and commodified. These platforms make more money than the ATO (Australian Tax Office) brings in a year. I think they have the moral obligation and means to create safer spaces- either inside or seperate fr…

If we are so concerned about the materials make the platforms moderate them like they used to do. Banning them reeks of favoring the murdoch outlets which are free to spread misinformation

Re: Australia begins enforcing world-first teen social media ban

#268

Post by marcosdumay »

feb012025 wrote: post #169
whimsicalism wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Scrollable video is killing the Dems in general, not just because of Israel. It's like all the worst of local news crime reporting on steroids.

Each party is splitting into factions. I imagine the establishment of both parties think social media is a problem

It's almost as if a country's population need more than 2 parties to express themselves.

Re: Australia begins enforcing world-first teen social media ban

#269

Post by jjcm »

I've said this before, but if countries want to mandate compliance, they should be required to provide the mechanism for compliance.

The rollout of this has been pretty rough all things considered, much of it because the mechanism for compliance is flawed. Anthony Albanese's latest instgram posts are full of comments from teens saying things like, "how am i still on instagram if you banned us". The primary reason for this is most providers are leveraging age-estimation techniques, because the law specifically states:

    > 63DB Use of certain identification material and services

    >   (1) A provider of an age-restricted social media platform must not:

    >     (a) collect government-issued identification material
In an effort to prevent identity theft, the bill as originally written(1) was updated(2) to forbid platforms from collecting government IDs as a proof of age. Even if you support the intent of the bill, the design-by-committee approach made the requirements so easy to circumvent that it's effectively security theater.

(1) Original bill: https://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/download/legislation/bi...

(2) Bill that passed after rewrites: https://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/download/legislation/bi...

Re: Australia begins enforcing world-first teen social media ban

#270

Post by daedrdev »

jjcm wrote: post #269

I've said this before, but if countries want to mandate compliance, they should be required to provide the mechanism for compliance. The rollout of this has been pretty rough all things considered, much of it because the mechanism for compliance is flawed. Anthony Albanese's latest instgram posts are full of comments from teens saying things like, "how am i still on instagram if you banned us". The primary reason for…

So how does someone locked out wrongfully prove their age? Some people just look kinda young
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