Comment by abustamam
3 days ago
If I went to the store and asked for a pack of cigarettes, I show my ID (well, I would if I was carded, but I'm no longer carded :)) and the clerk looks at it, maybe scans it, then takes my money.
If I try to go to an adult website, or even just a discord server with adult content, I need to upload my ID. And now there's numerous third parties who now are looking at my ID, and I have no idea if I can trust them with my info. Indeed, I probably can't, given how many of them have already been breached.
Of all the people, PornHub actually has a pretty good write-up on this (1) (2), and they refer to "device-based" age verification, where you verify your identity once to say, Google or whoever. Then your device proves your age. Fewer middlemen. One source of truth.
I am not against age verification. I am against the surveillance state.
(1) https://www.pornhub.com/blog/age-verification-in-the-news
(2) https://www.xbiz.com/news/281228/opinion-why-device-based-ag...
> they refer to "device-based" age verification, where you verify your identity once to say, Google or whoever. Then your device proves your age. Fewer middlemen. One source of truth.
This is still an absurdity. You don't need the device to prove the age of the user to the service, you need the service to provide the age restriction of the content to the device. Then the device knows if the user is an adult or a kid and thereby knows whether to display the content, and you don't need Google to know that.
Major porn sites already send an RTA header. Social media could be required to do similar. However I think part of the concern here is that many parents don't bother to restrict things. So the question is if we want filtering similar to alcohol where minors aren't permitted to possess it, or similar to porn where the decision is left up to parents.
In many states it's perfectly legal for parents to provide their kids with alcohol. Only stores can't do it. And many religious rites involve wine, for example. Moreover, it would be up to parents either way, because even in the ID case, if parents want to allow their kids to access everything they could just provide them with a device configured under the parent's ID.
At which point there is no reason to invade everyone's privacy with IDs because parents can just make their choice when configuring the device their kids use and have the device rather than the service choose what to display.
1 reply →
IRL
> If I went to the store and asked for a pack of cigarettes
online
> and I have no idea if I can trust them with my info
Why did you trust how your ID was scanned (if carded)?
With security cameras present, where did that scanned data end up?
nit: the Discord ID verification hasn't rolled out yet has it?
No, I believe it's next month though.