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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

#51

Post by rel_ic »

onion2k wrote: post #42
bluGill wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really because nearly every adult has a phone with unlimited calling, and will allow you to make a call from their phone. I don't want my kids to be someplace where there are not some responsible adults around (drunk adults are not responsible) Note that I agree with your point overall. My kids have phones for times when they are away and might need to contact me. I'm just saying it isn't as bad as it sounds.

Not really because nearly every adult has a phone with unlimited calling, and will allow you to make a call from their phone. This isn't very compatible with also teaching children that they can't trust the majority of adults, and that every stranger is a potential danger.

Good point - folks should stop teaching them that. If your kid is really in a sea of dangerous adults their phone won't save them anyway.

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

#52

Post by CivBase »

goodcanadian wrote: post #34
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.

Also, it is arguably dangerous to not let your teen have a phone in a time when payphones (and to a great extent landlines) no longer exist.

Payphones were mostly extinct even when I was a kid. I didn't have a cellphone either and smartphones didn't exist yet, except for the extremely rare Blackberry. But it wsn't a problem because basically every establishment around me had a landline phone I could use in an emergency. Now even landlines are extinct because just about everyone has their own phone on them at all times. Phones are easier to come by now more than ever. Kids have never been safer, even without their own phones.

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

#53

Post by tombot »

akramachamarei wrote: post #45
goodcanadian wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, it is arguably dangerous to not let your teen have a phone in a time when payphones (and to a great extent landlines) no longer exist.

Dumbphones are still a thing

I really don’t know why there isn’t a brand that’s capitalising on this.

Messaging, calls, maps, notes but no way to take or view images. Marketed simply from a global brand.

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

#54

Post by azalemeth »

CrzyLngPwd wrote: post #27

"with nine out of 10 parents saying they are in favour of a ban in response to a government consultation" I wonder why those 90% of parents don't cut their children off from social media right now. They have the power to do it.

This statistic comes from here -- https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/parental-support-... -- a preliminary analysis of the consultation. The headline statement is:

    "Of the parents and carers of children aged 21 and under who responded to Question 12 on the full-length version of the consultation, 89% supported “a legal requirement for social media services to have a minimum age of access”."
However, what the government (and the media) are _NOT_ reporting is that the consultation also paid an independent firm to undertake a nationally representative survey of adults in the general population. The above document acknowledges this itself, by stating:

    Caveats and limitations

    Users should note the following when interpreting these results: 
    Self-selecting sample

    The consultation was open to anyone who chose to respond. The results reflect the views of parents and carers who were motivated to take part, and are not representative of parents and carers nationally. As with any open public consultation, respondents may differ systematically from the wider population in their views and characteristics. 
    Question routing

    These questions were only presented to respondents who wanted to respond to Chapter 2: Interventions for safer, more positive experiences. All questions in this section were optional. Finally, Question 13 was only presented to respondents who answered “Yes” to Question 12 (i.e. those who supported a legal requirement for a minimum age of access in principle). The 96% figure therefore relates to the level of agreement with a minimum age of at least 16 among those parents and carers who opted to respond to this Chapter and already supported some form of minimum age requirement. It does not represent the views of all consultation respondents, nor all parents and carers who responded.
    Full consultation only

    The figures relate only to the full-length version of the consultation, not the streamlined parents’ and children’s consultations.
Status of results

   These figures should be treated as provisional. A comprehensive analysis of all consultation responses will be published separately.consultation, respondents may differ systematically from the wider population in their views and characteristic
So, it's 90% of 9499 parents who specifically went out of their way to respond to a consultation widely heralded as being predetermined and about blocking access to social media. For context, in the 2021 census (massively disrupted by covid) there were 11.5 million schoolchildren and full-time students whose parents were the target of the survey.

The representative study isn't published yet. The provisional headline 90% number is.

[1] https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/educatio...

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

#55

Post by Tade0 »

Hugsbox wrote: post #29
CrzyLngPwd wrote: post #27

"with nine out of 10 parents saying they are in favour of a ban in response to a government consultation" I wonder why those 90% of parents don't cut their children off from social media right now. They have the power to do it.

Yeah, this I will seriously never understand. When I was a kid, if my mother didn't want me doing something then she would make sure I couldn't do it. Is nobody parenting their children anymore? Do they just let them do whatever they want these days? I've got a 2 year old of my own and can't imagine just handing him an iPad and ignoring him all day like I see other parents do. I can't tell if it's laziness, or ignora…

Co-working space coworker went once to a school to teach kids about online safety and such.

One of the exercises was to check out what you can and can't do with a locked-down smartphone. Several minutes later the kids figured out how to bypass parental controls using ChatGPT and the method spread like wildfire.

I recall defying my father's orders regularly. Teenagers who set their mind to something can be amazingly persistent. Most parents don't have the sort of resources required to control every aspect of their child's life like that. It's also harmful in the long run.

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

#56

Post by monooso »

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 (equally unpalatable) options.

Parents don't have to act individually. They could act as a collective, especially within the context of a small social group.

Is that really such a naive suggestion?

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

#57

Post by M95D »

bluGill wrote: post #40
M95D wrote: post #23

The nice solution would be content tags, standardized by w3c.

Those can only work if there is some way to ensure that everyone uses them correctly. I guarantee there will be many sites that don't - every single week the kids will discover a new one and spread it to all their friends (in their school)

Same if they find a new porn site that doesn't ask for ID check.

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

#58

Post by Tade0 »

Hugsbox wrote: post #37
Broken_Hippo wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uh-huh. For me, that meant that I didn't do something At Home, and was pretty much unsupervised other places. My mother was strict at a time when a lot of kids had freedom. I couldn't do much that other kids did. When I could, I had to jump through hoops. I lied to my mother a lot. My mother still isn't in the loop with my life - I'm in my late 40s now. It would have been much better to have been able to talk to my p…

I relate to this quite a lot, to be honest. There has to be some happy medium somewhere, though.

The happy middle is you not using social media, or smartphones for that matter, in front of them. Kids scrutinize everything you say and do and will notice the discrepancy.

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

#59

Post by pmg101 »

jMyles wrote: post #17
blockmarker wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While the powers pushing this aren't doing it for protecting children, there are many people who want restricting the internet to protect children. This is why it's a good cover instead of an obvious power grab, because parents want to stop their ten year old children from seeing porn or getting addicted to social media, but they don't know much about how to do it, the technology involved or who is pushing it. You mi…

I'm sorry, what?! I have an 11yo. I know a ton of parents. And I don't know a single person - not one - who thinks this is a good idea. And I've asked. Obviously this is just an anecdote and not a substitute for data. But... is there data on sentiment? I don't think it's actual parents who are pushing for this.

I have a 10yo. I know loads of parents too. I don't think I've ever heard the "freedom" position taken apart from on HN. To non-techies it just seems self evident we should block kids from seeing beheadings and donkey porn. They haven't usually thought much about how that would be achieved and what the knock on effects would be. But they do want it.

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

#60

Post by twiclo »

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…

Parents will get their kids phones worrying that they're missing out. The more parents do that the more the kids without phones are actually being left out. If the government puts restriction on these things than parents are much less likely to worry.

I've heard of parents of children for a certain grade getting together and all signing a pact that the kids won't have phones until a certain point, say 16. It only goes into effect if something like 75% of the parents for that grade sign on. I like that idea.

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