We do not need to lose our rights to privacy because people want to control what their kids do and see. (I'm not even convinced this is true - this is likely just a convenient lie told by the politicians, because I don't see parents clamoring for this.)
We're below replacement rate, so it's not like most people are even having kids, anyway. Yet we have to give up our freedom for other people to raise little Christian tots (or whatever the motivation for this is billed as)?
I grew up in a Deep South Protestant household. Having access to the unfiltered internet got me interested in STEM. Bumping into occasional shock sites and porn as a preteen did not turn me into a satanist cannibal.
Keeping "Kids Safe" is a LIE.
This is about putting collars on every US citizen.
They'll filter you into groups.
They'll control what loans and jobs you can get.
They'll use this information to blackmail you should you ever run for office or gain wealth or power.
This is a threat to democracy and personal liberty.
As a child circa 2000, I remember seeing explicit bestiality porn pop-ups while looking up video game cheat codes. You're right, the internet is much different now, and not in the way you're implying.
At global conferences like Davos, where national leaders and policy makers go to schmooze and exchange ideas, this idea has been discussed for years. I’m sure there has been some subsequent cross-border coordination and discussion.
Everyone ignores stuff like this because of people like Alex Jones who make it seem like a lunatic conspiracy theory. But these conferences happen, and they do influence policy. It’s not a “cabal” that issues orders—many participants are national leaders bringing their perspectives (see the link above about Sanchez)—but it does have an impact.
The banal truth is that many different world leaders have talked each other into this after years of discussion on the proper way to “manage” the Internet. They see cyberspace as a threat to top-down technocratic control and view Internet-enabled populism (aka democracy) as something to be quashed.
> [World leaders] see cyberspace as a threat to top-down technocratic control and view Internet-enabled populism (aka democracy) as something to be quashed.
This has been true ever since the creation of the internet and web.
It's what the original 90s crypto wars were about: the right of individuals to access strong encryption to preserve the privacy of their communications from the government.
Absent that, pandora's box opens.
Age KYC is just the next fight against encryption and privacy dressed up in "for the children" clothes.
Strong encryption always has (and always will) facilitate criminal and illegal activity. Tough tits.
Law enforcement and intelligence agencies should work within the bounds of individual rights, not adjust them for convenience.
If the price of individual freedom^ is that it's harder to track and prosecute child exploitation, drug distribution, and mass terror attacks, then that's the way it needs to be.
^ "Individual freedom" as distinct from corporate freedom. Fuck non-human legal entities' rights to access encryption, aside from on behalf of their users.
Because the internet is global and the negative effects of the internet are happening everywhere at the same time. Also, politicians look at other countries for ideas.
When nobody's done something before, there are lots of unanswered questions.
Is it even possible? Will businesses my voters like and use a lot just leave my country entirely? Will companies be able to develop privacy-preserving age check infrastructure? Will the press present it as a 'Chinese-style Great Firewall' or be more supportive of it? Will the blocks all be trivial to bypass? Will the large number of porn users in my country form a cohesive voting block? Will a powerful pro-privacy, pro-free-speech lobby emerge to challenge this? And will they be backed by powerful, well-funded US interests like Facebook and Google?
Australia simply showed the world passing this sort of legislation isn't political suicide.
kinda. but not really. they just showed a lack of effectiveness and has emboldened other countries to further restrict things like VPNs and roll out ID based net access
Because it is an organized attack. The lobbyists got their orders,
now they pull it through. It is kind of fascinating to see though -
I bet many people don't realise this coordinated attack. To me it
is blatantly easy to notice. I am glad to not be the only one here.
And if they do it anyway? Sure, you can vote them out but it's hard to dislodge incumbents especially over policy choices rather than obvious problems like corruption. Then even after you've ejected them, you need to push their successor into the Sisyphean task of rewriting populist legislation.
Representative democracy is not adequate to the demands of the information age, where the informational asymmetry between individual and state is unprecedented in history. It's time to explore other models like administrative democracy.
Coordinated opposition campaigns against misinformed and dangerous legislation has been effective in stopping bad laws [1]. After a website blackout, including a Wikipedia shutdown, lawmakers in Washington decided not to proceed with the Stop Online Privacy Act in 2012.
From your linked Wikipedia articles many corporations including Google were part of that opposite campaign. Exactly the type of people donating untold millions to our legislatures. Had nothing to do with any kind of grassroots pressure.
We do not need to lose our rights to privacy because people want to control what their kids do and see. (I'm not even convinced this is true - this is likely just a convenient lie told by the politicians, because I don't see parents clamoring for this.)
We're below replacement rate, so it's not like most people are even having kids, anyway. Yet we have to give up our freedom for other people to raise little Christian tots (or whatever the motivation for this is billed as)?
I grew up in a Deep South Protestant household. Having access to the unfiltered internet got me interested in STEM. Bumping into occasional shock sites and porn as a preteen did not turn me into a satanist cannibal.
Keeping "Kids Safe" is a LIE.
This is about putting collars on every US citizen.
They'll filter you into groups.
They'll control what loans and jobs you can get.
They'll use this information to blackmail you should you ever run for office or gain wealth or power.
This is a threat to democracy and personal liberty.
Child safety is a LIE.
When did you grow up? The internet in 2006 and 2026 were nothing alike.
As a child circa 2000, I remember seeing explicit bestiality porn pop-ups while looking up video game cheat codes. You're right, the internet is much different now, and not in the way you're implying.
4 replies →
Heh, yeah, kids in 90s and 00s were asked a/s/l from the outset, openly.
That's not happening like this, also because peer and public tolerance for it is nearly nil.
The internet now is much safer.
Yeah, the 2026 internet is way safer
The internet in 1986 and 1996 was nothing like 2006.
2006 is on the other side of the event horizon of "Don't be evil."
4 replies →
Go on...
Isn't it interesting how they're doing it in every anglo country simultaneously? How does that work?
At global conferences like Davos, where national leaders and policy makers go to schmooze and exchange ideas, this idea has been discussed for years. I’m sure there has been some subsequent cross-border coordination and discussion.
For instance:
https://idtechwire.com/spains-pm-proposes-mandatory-digital-...
https://www.weforum.org/publications/reimagining-digital-id/
https://www.weforum.org/stories/2021/01/davos-agenda-digital...
Everyone ignores stuff like this because of people like Alex Jones who make it seem like a lunatic conspiracy theory. But these conferences happen, and they do influence policy. It’s not a “cabal” that issues orders—many participants are national leaders bringing their perspectives (see the link above about Sanchez)—but it does have an impact.
The banal truth is that many different world leaders have talked each other into this after years of discussion on the proper way to “manage” the Internet. They see cyberspace as a threat to top-down technocratic control and view Internet-enabled populism (aka democracy) as something to be quashed.
> [World leaders] see cyberspace as a threat to top-down technocratic control and view Internet-enabled populism (aka democracy) as something to be quashed.
This has been true ever since the creation of the internet and web.
It's what the original 90s crypto wars were about: the right of individuals to access strong encryption to preserve the privacy of their communications from the government.
Absent that, pandora's box opens.
Age KYC is just the next fight against encryption and privacy dressed up in "for the children" clothes.
Strong encryption always has (and always will) facilitate criminal and illegal activity. Tough tits.
Law enforcement and intelligence agencies should work within the bounds of individual rights, not adjust them for convenience.
If the price of individual freedom^ is that it's harder to track and prosecute child exploitation, drug distribution, and mass terror attacks, then that's the way it needs to be.
^ "Individual freedom" as distinct from corporate freedom. Fuck non-human legal entities' rights to access encryption, aside from on behalf of their users.
3 replies →
Because the internet is global and the negative effects of the internet are happening everywhere at the same time. Also, politicians look at other countries for ideas.
When nobody's done something before, there are lots of unanswered questions.
Is it even possible? Will businesses my voters like and use a lot just leave my country entirely? Will companies be able to develop privacy-preserving age check infrastructure? Will the press present it as a 'Chinese-style Great Firewall' or be more supportive of it? Will the blocks all be trivial to bypass? Will the large number of porn users in my country form a cohesive voting block? Will a powerful pro-privacy, pro-free-speech lobby emerge to challenge this? And will they be backed by powerful, well-funded US interests like Facebook and Google?
Australia simply showed the world passing this sort of legislation isn't political suicide.
kinda. but not really. they just showed a lack of effectiveness and has emboldened other countries to further restrict things like VPNs and roll out ID based net access
Because it is an organized attack. The lobbyists got their orders, now they pull it through. It is kind of fascinating to see though - I bet many people don't realise this coordinated attack. To me it is blatantly easy to notice. I am glad to not be the only one here.
One cannot use a handwavey "organized" and "coordinated" without a subject. Who specifically do you propose is ordering this?
3 replies →
Globalism + Oligarchy
Don't forget to enclose a check
And if they do it anyway? Sure, you can vote them out but it's hard to dislodge incumbents especially over policy choices rather than obvious problems like corruption. Then even after you've ejected them, you need to push their successor into the Sisyphean task of rewriting populist legislation.
Representative democracy is not adequate to the demands of the information age, where the informational asymmetry between individual and state is unprecedented in history. It's time to explore other models like administrative democracy.
Details on how to do that here:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48711871
and have your children on the phone telling them to not let companies store and leak their information before they are old enough to consent to this.
If they are asking you to leave a message, have your kids leave the message.
Then donate millions in campaign contributions to ensure they actually care at all what you think!
Coordinated opposition campaigns against misinformed and dangerous legislation has been effective in stopping bad laws [1]. After a website blackout, including a Wikipedia shutdown, lawmakers in Washington decided not to proceed with the Stop Online Privacy Act in 2012.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop_Online_Piracy_Act
From your linked Wikipedia articles many corporations including Google were part of that opposite campaign. Exactly the type of people donating untold millions to our legislatures. Had nothing to do with any kind of grassroots pressure.
Woohoo, what about this great success (checks notes) 14 years ago?! You think political counterparties don't adapt and refine their tactics?
Money is a poor substitute for people who care.
The only people who think otherwise are terminally online losers who have never organized anything larger than a birthday party.
https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2023/09/19/money-power-...
seems like a lot more people believe that than the population you are describing
1 reply →
Are you talking from experience? What legislation have you organised?
7 replies →
Maybe in your country but not in the hellhole that is the US.
2 replies →
Espiallat ($9.5 million) vs Darializa (350k)
Money matters but a popular movement is more powerful still in some places look up DSA
Unfortunately "some places" does not include the US federal government.