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UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

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Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#71

Post by tlb »

badgersnake wrote: post #49
aranw wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've written to my MP several times about this. Each response just repeats the same talking points about safety whilst completely missing the underlying technical issues and consequences.

Same, my MP is clueless. They won’t listen to the experts. This is what he said: The UK has a strong tradition of safeguarding privacy while ensuring that appropriate action can be taken against criminals, such as child sexual abusers and terrorists. I firmly believe that privacy and security are not mutually exclusive—we can and must have both. The Investigatory Powers Act governs how and when data can be requested…

All of which is arguably true, but misses the point that uploading your age verification documents to every social media site you might want to look at is very likely to result in them getting hacked and leaked.

Working with startups, I've signed up for 100s of sites. My password manager lists 550. Those signups are currently low-risk: just my email (already widely public) and a random password. But it would put a big chill on my work if I had to upload government age verification docs to each one.

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#72

Post by notTooFarGone »

giacomoforte wrote: post #70

Are there any remaining western countries with strong free speech protections? UK and Germany weren't ever good in this department but now worst than ever. US supposedly good but I wouldn't risk it in practice. Australia I hear is also quite bad. Canada and NZ I don't know. I expect Denmark and Sweden to have somewhat weak free speech laws too. Norway and Finland I expect to be good. France I expect to be just slight…

How is age verification and free speech in any case related?

You can solve the problem of age verification without limiting your free speech right. Those two get entangled all the time and it does not make sense.

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#73

Post by [deleted] »

pnut wrote: post #60
throw__away7391 wrote: post #53

Every government in the world right now wants to get their hands on the controls and put their thumb on the scales here. Modern social media has proven to be effectively remote control for their citizens, nothing like this kind of power has never existed before and is absolutely irresistible to politicians. Expect them all to be laser focused on this until they're able to seize complete control, no matter how long it…

Counterpoint - Governments are attempting to wrest political control away from coordinated global corporate fascists.

[deleted]

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#74

Post by FrostViper8 »

badgersnake wrote: post #49
aranw wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've written to my MP several times about this. Each response just repeats the same talking points about safety whilst completely missing the underlying technical issues and consequences.

Same, my MP is clueless. They won’t listen to the experts. This is what he said: The UK has a strong tradition of safeguarding privacy while ensuring that appropriate action can be taken against criminals, such as child sexual abusers and terrorists. I firmly believe that privacy and security are not mutually exclusive—we can and must have both. The Investigatory Powers Act governs how and when data can be requested…

The response is the same boilerplate responses I used to get when I used to write to my MP. This is why I just gave up emailing my MP. You are essentially pleading with someone to reverse their previous position when they have no incentive do to so.

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#75

Post by chrisjj »

Quarrelsome wrote: post #28

What I find particularly tragic about all of this legislation (the OSA and now this) is that there are obviously technical people in the room that would advise against this clusterfuck of a direction and they are being ignored by politicians who think the internet is something they can aggressively control. This will continue to push people towards providers who operate outside UK jurisdiction or providers that care…

> If they had extended this process by creating a OAuth compliant digital id provider first, then they could have avoided all the problems on the day the OSA dropped.

Far less than all. See Australia, where age restriction is routinely evaded through adult collusion.

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#77

Post by moritonal »

I don't get why the device changes the blame logic.

If child-services knew a parent was constantly watching/leaving around adult-content near children, that'd be considered the parents fault. If a parent lets a kid watch anything they want on TV and the kid watches adult content, it's the parents fault. But if the parent gives the child a phone, and doesn't manage what apps they use or content they watch, now it's the companies fault?

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#78

Post by FrostViper8 »

notTooFarGone wrote: post #72
giacomoforte wrote: post #70

Are there any remaining western countries with strong free speech protections? UK and Germany weren't ever good in this department but now worst than ever. US supposedly good but I wouldn't risk it in practice. Australia I hear is also quite bad. Canada and NZ I don't know. I expect Denmark and Sweden to have somewhat weak free speech laws too. Norway and Finland I expect to be good. France I expect to be just slight…

How is age verification and free speech in any case related? You can solve the problem of age verification without limiting your free speech right. Those two get entangled all the time and it does not make sense.

If your ID is tied to your anonymous identity this creates a chilling effect.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chilling_effect

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#79

Post by chrisjj »

pjc50 wrote: post #34

Same article also says the bill includes a ban on social media for users under 16, like Australia. Pretty dramatic change. Meanwhile the government and official accounts continue to use X even as they're trying to ban it. Mixed messaging. Lead proponent of the VPN ban: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Nash,_Baron_Nash ; he's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centre_for_Policy_Studies again, the dead hand of Thatcherism…

> a ban on social media for users under 16, like Australia. Pretty dramatic change. Meanwhile the government and official accounts continue to use X even as they're trying to ban it. Mixed messaging.

I think you'd find Govt. account users are over 16.

Re: UK House of Lords Votes to Extend Age Verification to VPNs

#80

Post by chrisjj »

callamdelaney wrote: post #68
pjc50 wrote: post #34

Same article also says the bill includes a ban on social media for users under 16, like Australia. Pretty dramatic change. Meanwhile the government and official accounts continue to use X even as they're trying to ban it. Mixed messaging. Lead proponent of the VPN ban: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Nash,_Baron_Nash ; he's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centre_for_Policy_Studies again, the dead hand of Thatcherism…

Should be a smartphone ban, which would actually be enforceable.

How? Parents would give smartphones to their kids.
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