But some of the easiest middle ground solutions that solve 90% of the problem are things like simple math problems. Get asked "3+7" and that will pretty quickly filter out almost anyone under the age of 6. If you can accept that there are some smart 4 or 5 year olds who can do simple math, congrats you recognize there's a 10%.
what kind of websites are you visiting to get age checked on half of the sites you visit? i've only been asked to verify for dating apps and "sexy stuff". and i definitely don't spend 50% of my total browsing time on those sites.
maybe this says more about the kind of content/sites you're accessing if it is really as high as 50%? UK age verification mostly only applies to sites which might end up hosting the content quoted below.
> pornographic images, and content that encourages, promotes, or provides instructions for eating disorders, self-harm, or suicide.
or you're just being hyperbolic? 79% of statistics are made up, after all.
I don't use that; it's worse for your brain than any regulated substance. Kick your reddit habit while you can.
Google safe search: I've only seen this from my PAYG mobile phone, because I've never bothered to lift the adult content lock on that after more than a decade, and Google is the only place I've seen ask, actually. Even so it rarely happens.
Discord: the mere idea of being in an adult-content-related discord group is enough to make my skin crawl.
Worth noting that of these three, only one of them is a UK-only decision, as far as I am aware: Google Safe Search respects UK phone companies' default adult content block on PAYG. They are about the only company that does. Reddit and Discord have made this decision globally, have they not? Because there are US state laws too.
there are thousands of comments on these threads every time it comes up. there's tons of what i consider reasonable solutions proposed. there's examples below, too, which don't require face scans.
>Concretely, half the websites I visit from the UK want me to either scan my face or upload ID documents
yeah, i agree that really sucks.
i think its a pretty decent step up from that, but i know what you mean.
>I don't think the politicians will be satisfied.
and that circles back to my original point. the politicians aren't satisfied with a "mostly effective" solution (e.g. OS-enforced age attestation) as they are with literally every other law, and instead are taking advantage of the issue to justify mass surveillance.
There is a signaling function these laws serve: things are the products we consider acceptable in society. We have these rules for cigarettes, booze, and vapes.
That said, privacy being sacrificed for signals, is an unacceptable trade, especially when better solutions can be crafted.
Do not support daughter fuckers in goverment!
On that website, you can click "give me a verification code", it gives you a code that is single use and only valid 24 hours. You type that into whatever 18+ website you need to, they use a public API provided by the government to just check "yes this is a valid code and the user is 18" - bang, done, verified. The website knows nothing about you at all, except for the fact that you're 18.
In fact, the UK government ALREADY HAS THIS. For the EU settlement scheme, you can give your employeer(or anyone else who needs it) a special magic code that they type in on the government website, and it just says "yet his person has the right to reside in the UK" without spilling any of your personal information at all. The code is single use and valid a limited amount of time. And you can do the same with your driving licence, where anyone can verify you hold a valid licence without actually seeing it or any details on it.
Like, am I being stupid here? It seems like an almost trivial solution to the problem, especially given that it already exists for at least 2 services named above.
And yes, I know people will say "oh but that requires the government having this data on you, and that's bad" or "but then the government will know you've authenticated with pornhub!".
And yes, both of these are true - but on point 1 - like, I'd love some ideal situation where the government can simultaniously give me a passport or a driving licence AND not have any information about me at the same time, but that ain't happening, and on point 2 - yes, but that's still infinitely preferable to the current implementation, and it can be easily solved with legislation saying that the code authentication service doesn't log who requested verification, it just answers with yes/no and that's it.
And "the government will know you've authenticated with pornhub" is extremely harmful, in my opinion.
I have personally had to remove NCII for teens and young adults. Grooming is a thing, self harm communities are a thing, as is sextortion.All of it at internet scale.
And this ignores the parts where the platforms released features they knew from their own tests, were harmful to teens.
It is convenient to dismiss them, because it makes it easier to hold positions that depend on them being minor harms.
This is unacceptable tyranny on its face.
...how? All they know is you've authenticated with service X. And like I said, we can make legislation to say they are not allowed to keep the record of who authenticated.
Besides, let's not let perfect be the enemy of the good - in the UK all ISPs are required to keep a full year of your browsing history, and 17 government agencies can access this data(including DEFRA - the agriculture agency lol). So like....the "the government will have a full history of your browsing" is a ship that sailed a few years ago. Obviously I don't agree with it, and I think we should be on the streets of London and protesting this, but here we are as a country.
So like yeah, I get your point. But UK is particularily fucked on this point, let's not make it even more fucked with the way things currently are, the authentication can and should be done better.
Who are these adults giving children their verification codes for adult websites?
Why? One code for one user account per site. If you're paranoid about privacy rotate codes and accounts weekly. As long as you can purchase the codes with cash in IRL stores the privacy impact is minimal.
>>If you want to crack down on code sharing
Right now, all the kid has to do is grab their parents passport while they are not home or asleep, scan it on their phone and they are in. It takes 30 seconds.
With the codes they would either need to convince their parents to generate a code for them, or find someone online who will - which of these solutions seems less prone to abuse to you?
Again, let's not let perfect be the enemy of the good.