Europe's Age Verification proposal under flak for Google dependency
Age verification continues to be a hot topic in several regions and countries, including the European Union. The main question surrounding various solutions is whether age verification checks should be implemented to block access to certain content for (mainly) minors.
Critics argue that age verification systems have issues, including privacy issues, high implementation costs, that they may be ineffective and that there is potential for overreach and censorship.
The European Union is working on an open-source Android application for age verification that is part of a wider Age Verification Solution Toolbox that members of the EU may use to develop national age verification solutions.
The main purpose of the application is to "obtain, store, and present an age verification attestation" and "share the proof of age attestation with online services to gain access". The current implementation is "developed solely for the purpose of demonstrating the business flow", according to the description on GitHub.
This did not protect it from criticism leveled against the solution. The primary concern of users, at least judging on the GitHub repository, is the project's use of Google Play Integrity API and Apple App Attestation for verification of apps and devices.
The two established services may look like good candidates for such checks initially. They are operated by the companies behind Android and iOS after all. However, both are operated by companies from the United States, which would further "deepen the EU's dependency" according to one critic of the proposed system and put identity verification in the hands of a foreign corporation.
Furthermore, the system would only work with apps and devices that can be verified through Google Play or Apple's AppStore, and require that users use Google or Apple accounts on their devices and accept the terms of service of the American companies. While most do that, it would certainly impact users who jailbreak their devices or use custom roms. It would also prevent anyone from accessing certain services, if they do not use an Android or Apple phone, or prefer not to use one for the purpose of age verification.
Another user pointed out that an identity verification app already exists that would fit many of the requirements. The Dutch-based Yivi application can be used for age verification and does not rely on Google or Apple for the functionality.
The issue remains open at the time of writing and new comments are added regularly to it. Whether that will impact development of the app remains to be seen.
Now You: what is your take on age verification on the Internet?
What concerns me are the downsides, such as the possibility that measures which are not merely restrictive but prohibitive could drive young people into other, more dangerous environments — for example, the digital sphere, which is nearly impossible to regulate, like the deep web. Exclusion brings the risk of pushing individuals toward more hazardous spaces.
We’re not talking about young people from the 60s, 70s, or 80s — we’re talking about a generation born into a connected world, with digital skills far beyond those of their grandparents and, in many cases, even their parents. They have much broader access to knowledge and, potentially, to more dangerous spaces.
Exclusion-based measures punish by removing individuals from a regulated and familiar environment, while accountability-based measures keep individuals within that space, but under clear rules, proportional sanctions, and opportunities for educational or corrective interventions.
The whole thing is ridiculous… The government should never ever ever play the role of parent. Ever!
The whole thing is a parenting issue, well it should be…but we all know its about control and digital passports for everyone to be tracked.
@T, mixing feasibility and ideals is always a tough challenge and perhaps pragmatism an arguable approach.
Considering the downsides of a decision to invalidate, or at least to argue on its pertinence, is a real problematic. I have no fixed position because I’m far from any certitudes.
Should we sink a boat-people’s embarkation because letting it make its way will encourage those who make a business out of it and that sinking it, beyond a present drama, save many other lives by discouraging future attempts?
What should a mother decide when a terrorist imposes here to choose between the life of her child and the lives of a whole village?
Pragmatism is not always the way to go, is it? What way is? One major argument may be that we consider that one’s consciousness should deploy in terms of its immediate imperatives, another is to consider implications should prevail. yet implications project a future as an evidence when in fact we know nothing in that we may not dare any certitude of near or late future. Personally, and I admit that faith in God is not a rational guide, my faith heavily weighs in privileging the former. Nevertheless I couldn’t, still cannot at my age, be formal.
Bureaucrats forget that today’s youth were born into a connected world, unlike many of those who create legislation. Teenagers today don’t just use the digital environment — they are shaped by it. In other words, it’s a generation born into two worlds. Let me draw an analogy. In the physical world, there are illegal activities — for example, selling alcohol or drugs to minors — but young people are not banned from existing in that space. Those who sell alcohol to minors can be held accountable. In my view, the digital world should follow the same principle: rather than banning or excluding youth, we should focus on holding wrongdoers accountable when crimes occur.
It’s important to note that laws from the physical world are also applicable in the digital realm. What could be considered is increasing penalties when offenses happen in the digital environment.
To be brief, the villain is not the physical or digital world, but the individuals within them. Avoiding an environment doesn’t solve the problem — it only masks it. In my view, treating the environment as the villain is a way of shifting focus away from real responsibility, leading to false solutions that merely move the problem elsewhere.
Once upon a time governments used to create things of value such as sewage systems, electricity grids, rail networks. The only thing governments work on these days is creating a bigger and bigger dystopia.
@ECJ, we’ve always had “traditional” oppressive regimes, political systems but what we encounter nowadays, increasingly, what you define as “a bigger and bigger dystopia” (referring I presume to the Western world democracies) is maybe a societal issue rather than that of governments, a society where idealism is vanishing as consumerism has become the new god : we no longer strive for a better world for all, preferring a better one for ourselves, for our bellies.
The present crisis is existentialist, I believe. Hence extremism, winds of far-right pseudo-values developing segregation, falling back to or emphasizing on racism, homophobia, xenophobia, misogyny in the name of counter-values intended to try to give a meaning to lives which desperately search for values given consuming fails to bring happiness. Humanity is presently, in my view, more pathetic than ever. Humanity minus those of us who imagine tomorrows as John Lennon did and behave accordingly. Until when?
Society is not, has never been a supra-human reality, we are the society, we compose it, all of us; therefor no coherence IMO between criticizing a world in march towards values we deny when we don’t behave, each of us, in a perspective beyond our individuality, that is for a better world for all… and not only for ourselves : at the end the equation is always one of fraternity, whatever you call it.
I forgot to mention ‘Desiderata’, an apolitical, non religious lecture, an extraordinary blend of good sense and “feasible” idealism, written by Max Ehrmann in the 1920s, timeless: [https://www.fleurdelis.com/desiderata.htm]
Whenever I visit sites I’m practically always logged into a VPN, namely Mullvad. But I’ve discovered a potential issue on the horizon which could impact the way Age Verification works when using Mullvad’s VPN.
It concerns the option to enable Mullvad’s SOCKS5 proxy as an additional privacy tool. With SOCKS5 disabled the TCP/IP fingerprint visible on https://browserleaks.com/ip shows it to be Windows which is fine. But if SOCKS5 is enabled, the same fingerprint changes to Android.
So if Age Verification is required on an adult site somewhere via an app and the user is running Windows, but appears to be running Android for all intents and purposes I wonder what the consequences will be.
I’ve been in touch with Mullvad about this, but they advised me that the SOCKS5 proxy is a server side implementation over which they have no control and therefore can’t be changed.
Age verification will work on people 50+ who probably are not the intended target group.
On the topic of preventing people seeing content, I saw a video where British football fans were chanting something like “we would not pay, we will pirate your games with Fire Sticks”.
Attempting to block access to porn – or just about anything – on the web is a fool’s errand. You really think teenage boys will see the age-check screen and say “Well, I guess this means I won’t be seeing any porn until I’m 18 (or whatever age it is). I better stop any thoughts of masturbation and return to my homework.”?
Yeah, no. I didn’t think so.
This will just drive kids to access dodgier sites – of which there are a roughly infinite number – that don’t bother with age checks.
I belive most people are worried about the data havesting of what they use any age verification process or accout to sign up for, and the possibilities public release of that information along with the security of the information they have to provide that might be compromised.
First, do we agree with age verification? I do.
Second, is age verification digitally feasible? Tough until now and still is.
For sure that age verification by means of a scanned Identity Card and/or a bank credentials is privacy intrusive.
For sure as well that perhaps the main area concerned by age verification is pornography and that, if sex by itself is already a confidential topic, when it comes to it being a vector of the worst may trigger more than ever privacy requirements. May or may not given the trend nowadays it to consider any moral barrier as one of freedom … you may find on those sites healthy minds, couples in quest of eroticism as well as dirty old pigs, and the latter will of course be the most reluctant to play transparency. Not to mention the pornography environment, the way porn ‘actors’ are treated, especially the younger ones, in authentically disgusting terms.
Other means as those described in the article will never have mmy approval should they use services and servers located outside of the EU : we (me, myself and many more) DO NOT WANT American companies tied to whatever confidential information, not to mention that they struggle to access what we’d process as non-confidential (where’s the red-line by the way?)
We do need a European service which would not be private, under the direct authority of the EU only, located within the EU.
I discover with the article the Dutch-based Yivi application that “can be used for age verification and does not rely on Google or Apple for the functionality.”. Seems a valid approach though I don’t know how it really works.
Here in France we have a public postal service called ‘L’Identité Numérique La Poste’ (‘Digital Identity’) which is not natively aimed at age verification as far as I know (I don’t use it myself) but which could maybe include it…
Age verification by digital means remains a tough challenge, not even sure it’ll ever be feasible in a bullet-proof way : the doubt relies on a non-written rule which is that anything digital finds sooner or later a workaround to its requisites.
What a coincidence when I wrote above (OK, seems obvious)
“Age verification by digital means remains a tough challenge, not even sure it’ll ever be feasible in a bullet-proof way : the doubt relies on a non-written rule which is that anything digital finds sooner or later a workaround to its requisites.”
and land on this article:
‘Gamers fool UK age verification with Death Stranding | Windows Central’
[https://www.windowscentral.com/gaming/gamers-bypass-uk-age-verification-with-death-stranding-no-real-face-or-vpn-required]
Good intentions humiliated by smart refusals.