See? It was never about children. Never fails.
Corporations literally buy the laws they want and Silicon Valley is the newest lobbying monster. Genuinely terrifying.
Meta Platforms: Lobbying, dark money, and the App Store Accountability Act
61–70 of 1001 posts
Re: Meta Platforms: Lobbying, dark money, and the App Store Accountability Act
#62I am now waiting for Gruber (daringfireball.net) to post another rant about how terrible EU regulation is. Zero-knowledge proofs are the way to go for this type of thing, I find it mind-boggling that the US lets itself be bamboozled into complete lack of privacy.
Two billion in lobbying. And the conclusion is that regulation is the problem?
Re: Meta Platforms: Lobbying, dark money, and the App Store Accountability Act
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
I am from EU, and contrary to age verification laws in general. My stance is that if somebody is a minor, his/her/their parents/tutors/legal guardian are responsible for what they can/cannot do online, and that the mechanism to enforce that is parental control on devices. Having said that, open-source zero-knowledge proofs are infinitely less evil (I refuse to say "better") than commercial cloud-based age monitoring…
> My stance is that if somebody is a minor, his/her/their parents/tutors/legal guardian are responsible for what they can/cannot do online As a parent, sure, that is my stance as well. What... what other stances are there even? How would they work?
The other stance is that most parents are not capable of winning a battle against tech giants for the mind of their children, just as parents were not capable of winning this fight with tobacco and alcohol companies.
Re: Meta Platforms: Lobbying, dark money, and the App Store Accountability Act
#64For a project attempting to track these and coordinate technical resistance, see: https://github.com/AntiSurv/oss-anti-surveillance
These bills also need to be opposed on a legal/political level.
Something I realized last night is that people who lie about their age to send false signals may inadvertently open themselves up to CFAA liability (a felony). So this is a serious matter for users who want to maintain anonymity.
Re: Meta Platforms: Lobbying, dark money, and the App Store Accountability Act
#65Earlier quoted context omitted.
The steelman argument is that parents are not necessarily up to date on the technology, and cannot reasonably be expected to supervise teenagers 24/7 up to the age of 18. Compare movie ratings or alcohol laws, for example: there's a non-parental obligation on third parties not to provide alcohol to children or let them in to R18 showings. But the implementation matters, and almost all of these bills internationally a…
That steelman still stands on a core assumption that its both the state's responsibility and right to step in and parent on everyone's behalf. Maybe a majority of people today agree with that, but I know I don't and I never hear that assumption debated directly.
Then frankly you haven’t seen many debates around age verification as it’s the main thing discussed every time it’s brought up
Re: Meta Platforms: Lobbying, dark money, and the App Store Accountability Act
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
You could make the same case for parental control as evil. "You‘re reading about evolution! Not in my house"
Parents already have a lot of control on children' education. Examples: most children believe in the same religion as their parents, and can visit friends and places only if/when allowed by their parents. This is simply extending the same level of control to the internet. Government-mandated restrictions are completely another level.
I have personally worked with parents trying to prevent their children from using social media and it’s nearly impossible. Kids are almost always more tech savvy than their parents and unlike smoking it’s nearly impossible to tell a child is doing so without watching them 100% of the time.
Re: Meta Platforms: Lobbying, dark money, and the App Store Accountability Act
#67Earlier quoted context omitted.
When the government decides not to issue certificates to websites they don't like.
Oh, stop. Tinfoil-hatting like this is how privacy and internet freedom activism gets a bad rap. QWAC certs are only for "high value" sites: banks, government services, etc. They can only be issued by "Qualified Trust Service Providers" (e.g. digisign, D-TRUST, etc -- not governments), and cost many hundreds of euros. Your blog and mastodon instance and 98% of businesses just aren't affected. People operating in "hig…
This is how total control of a platform always starts. Google starts with Android and just does digital signing for applications through their store. Until they achieve control of the platform, then suddenly you can't load your own applications without them signing it either.
Secure Boot is just a technology for those that need it, until Microsoft decides it's mandatory for everyone.
Re: Meta Platforms: Lobbying, dark money, and the App Store Accountability Act
#68I am now waiting for Gruber (daringfireball.net) to post another rant about how terrible EU regulation is. Zero-knowledge proofs are the way to go for this type of thing, I find it mind-boggling that the US lets itself be bamboozled into complete lack of privacy.
it's not about protecting children. that's only the PR. once you get this you stop asking why the tech details are the way they are.
Counterpoint: yes it is
Re: Meta Platforms: Lobbying, dark money, and the App Store Accountability Act
#69Earlier quoted context omitted.
Oh, that's a different topic: as someone from and living in eastern Europe, there's not a single doubt in my mind that the biggest threat to any civilization is russia by a long shot. The alarming part is that the current US administration hasn't got a single clue of history, suffers from chronic incompetence and the whole superiority complex and fanboying russia as a consequence - those pose a threat. In the context…
> the biggest threat to any civilization is russia Surely you meant this as hyperbole, right? If not, I would love your reasoning as to why its a bigger threat than literally anything and anyone else.
I think this is entirely reasonable given the history of Russia vs Eastern Europe, but especially the invasion of Ukraine. Russia is currently being held at the Dnipro river, but Putin has stated his intention to "recapture" most of the former USSR.
Re: Meta Platforms: Lobbying, dark money, and the App Store Accountability Act
#70Every single Linux kernel currently operating within the borders of any of these states should turn itself off and refuse to boot until an update is installed after these bills are rolled back. We should also update all FOSS license terms to explicitly exclude Meta or any affilites from using any software licensed under them.
Honestly, like the Left-pad incident [1], getting things to go suddenly dark is extremely effective at getting people to drop everything else to fix an issue. Ideally, getting these servers to auto turn off the day this goes into effect ("In compliance with this new law, Linux is now temporarily unusable. Please .") would be glorious for getting the bill staved off, or killed. It would hurt some productivity, but tha…
"some"? It would hurt a lot of productivity lol. If all linux boxes turned themselves off suddenly, I think the internet would fall over pretty fast. I dont know how much of the internet runs on windows or apple (or others), but I cant imagine it's very much