I’m asking for public policy ideas here. A lot of countries are enacting age verification now. But of course this is a privacy nightmare and is ripe for abuse. At the same time though, I also understand why people are concerned with how kids are using social media. These products are designed to be addictive and are known to cause body image issues and so forth. So what’s the middle ground? How can we protect kids from the harms of social media in a way that respects everyone’s privacy?
In not in favor of providing ID for anything. If a service requires it, I won’t use that service. Also, I can’t think of a verification system like this that hasn’t been bypassed or exploited, so it’s largely an exercise in futility.
However, a compelling argument is to use your phone’s biometrics to perform a challenge and verification. Basically, your device acts as your ID so sites never have it. I think this way better than all websites to keep a copy of the identity.
Using biometrics is an interesting idea. It could be similar to Apples face-scan to unlock feature, where the model of your face never leaves your local device but can still be used as two factor authentication to access your banking, for example.
Exactly this. If I had to chose between hundreds of third party websites having my ID and my phone, I’ll take my phone.
We already have very sophisticated ways of validating payment and passport information with our devices. Validating age could be as simple as a registration procedure between the device and the identity issuer , validating the device is held by a person “of age” and then that’s it. If that user successfully completes a biometric challenge, then allow the activity.
So web browsing goes from “I’m John Doe and here’s my ID proving it” to every site (which has HUUUUUGE PRIVACY ISSUES) to “This anonymous user is over 18; this one is over 21, this one’s not”.
Also, if this behavior of forcing websites to ID you continues, it will enable a renaissance in data mining. Right now companies see “actor is in ZIP code 90210; rain in the forecast “ and put the two together to show “maybe they need a new slicker”. That’s simplified of course, but that’s basically the trick. You can use hundreds or thousands of these data points to paint an ever clearer picture of the person, but you never know exactly who they are. These ID laws are changing this rapidly.
This also has the potential to be used for some very dark purposes. Example: said something on Instagram critical of the US President? You don’t get to vote because of some label.
My position is still if the site or service requires my ID, then I don’t need it that badly.
Yeah. The OS based biometric model of verification definitely has some advantages over a service-by-service form of verification (so long as it’s done in a way that doesn’t make it easier to fingerprint based on device). The biggest concern I’d have though would be what this might do to niche operating systems, like Linux distros or Graphene OS. Will they be forced to enable age verification as well, and if so will they have the means to do that?
The comparison to credit card verification is interesting though and intuitively it seems like it would make it easier for niche operating systems to manage these requirements, since they could largely outsource that functionality (in the same way most websites outsource the handling of credit card information). This model still might make it easier for governments to profile people though. I’d be interested to hear what a privacy expert has to say about the viability or tradeoffs with a model like that.