3 ms·

It’s probably only a matter of time. The internet became the only place where age verification wasn’t really a thing. I’m honestly more surprised this didn’t h

It’s probably only a matter of time. The internet became the only place where age verification wasn’t really a thing. I’m honestly more surprised this didn’t happen 20 years ago.

m0rissette 4y ago
I don’t know about you but I still have to verify my age from time to time when certain sites ask I just have to click a button saying I am over X years old.
- remram 4y ago
  That's not "verifying" on the part of the site, that's just "warning".
ben_w 4y ago
20 years ago, Microsoft Internet Explorer had settings for exactly what maximum age rating of websites you wanted to be allowed to see. I vaguely remember one of the options being "full frontal nudity". Were there separate options for sex vs. violence, or was that just my imagination?
- dleslie 4y ago
  Content Advisor, it was added in IE6.
  - ben_w 4y ago
    You sure it was that late? Coulda sworn I was still at secondary school at the time, and I left there in summer of 2000…
wesleywt 4y ago
I believe it is not the responsibility of the government to police what your child is doing.
- robertlagrant 4y ago
  Some of them have taken on the responsibility of prosecuting vendors for selling certain material to minors. It's not what the child is doing; it's what the vendor is doing.
- commandlinefan 4y ago
  I believe that too... but you and I are very solidly in the minority.
- Aachen 4y ago
  I'm not sure I agree. If the parents don't do it, someone ought to. I disagree on the part that all types of porn (especially by the USA level of prudishness) is necessarily harmful to 16-year-olds.
dathinab 4y ago
I'm honestly surprised that there isn't a "good enough" "is adult" verification browser api thingy. Where "good enough" wrt. correctness doesn't mean crypto-graphically pro-oven but only "you need to do some hacky things to circumvent it". Because IMHO for anything which doesn't also require to know the _exact_ identity of the user that is good enough. Where "good enough" wrt. privacy doesn't mean perfect, but means for the "age verification provider" not worse then what fingerprinting can do even if you have a ad-blocker and for the "age verification checking" website means yes or no and that's all they get (preferable, in worst case also the identity of the "age verification provider" (e.g. some organization) id but under no circumstances anything more than that). Where "good enough" wrt. usability means you have to use an verification provider of your country (because what adult means differs). This solution isn't perfect, it doesn't distinguish between different countries having different ages for being adult and intentionally doesn't handle other age steps like 12+, 16+ (mainly matters for games). Honestly the only real problem I see is that in the US it can't be used to buy alcohol because for some reasons they don't allow adult to buy alcohol until 21 (but do allow them to do decisions way more dangerous then that). Except it's not really a problem as the US can define "internet adult" to be 21+, given that this is mainly needed for porn, buying alcohol etc. the US would love doing that anyway AFIK. I mean sometimes the perfect solutions is just to bothersome bother with it (the perfect solutions probably needs something like 0 knowledge proofs to preserve privacy).
- d_e_solomon 4y ago
  Quite a few places do age verification by requiring a small nominal fee in order to get an account. Most kids under 18 aren't going to have their own credit card or a credit card that their parents don't monitor.
  - dathinab 4y ago
    I have seen this fail very hard in practice. Because most kids can get there parents credit card number, and the "small nominal fee" is often too little and also often too cryptically booked for many parents to realize what is going on or to ask their bank about it. And because it's just a "small nominal fee" many kids are also not worried about causing any harm when doing so. Additionally with the credit card e-comerce system becoming more dominant in the world it becomes increasingly more likely for not-quite adults to have something which looks like a credit card for the shop (but likely acts a bit different behind the scene). Lastly it potentially leaks _a lot_ of private information, which in some contexts is okay but in others is not. Which is also why the small nominal fee trick works, it's often not just based on "only adults have a credit card" but on "let's use the credit card number to get a lot information about the user including if they are adult".

It’s probably only a matter of time. The internet became the only place where age verification wasn’t really a thing. I’m honestly more surprised this didn’t happen 20 years ago.

m0rissette 4y ago

I don’t know about you but I still have to verify my age from time to time when certain sites ask I just have to click a button saying I am over X years old.

remram 4y ago
That's not "verifying" on the part of the site, that's just "warning".

ben_w 4y ago

20 years ago, Microsoft Internet Explorer had settings for exactly what maximum age rating of websites you wanted to be allowed to see. I vaguely remember one of the options being "full frontal nudity". Were there separate options for sex vs. violence, or was that just my imagination?

dleslie 4y ago
Content Advisor, it was added in IE6.
- ben_w 4y ago
  You sure it was that late? Coulda sworn I was still at secondary school at the time, and I left there in summer of 2000…

wesleywt 4y ago

I believe it is not the responsibility of the government to police what your child is doing.

robertlagrant 4y ago
Some of them have taken on the responsibility of prosecuting vendors for selling certain material to minors. It's not what the child is doing; it's what the vendor is doing.
commandlinefan 4y ago
I believe that too... but you and I are very solidly in the minority.
Aachen 4y ago
I'm not sure I agree. If the parents don't do it, someone ought to. I disagree on the part that all types of porn (especially by the USA level of prudishness) is necessarily harmful to 16-year-olds.

dathinab 4y ago

I'm honestly surprised that there isn't a "good enough" "is adult" verification browser api thingy. Where "good enough" wrt. correctness doesn't mean crypto-graphically pro-oven but only "you need to do some hacky things to circumvent it". Because IMHO for anything which doesn't also require to know the _exact_ identity of the user that is good enough. Where "good enough" wrt. privacy doesn't mean perfect, but means for the "age verification provider" not worse then what fingerprinting can do even if you have a ad-blocker and for the "age verification checking" website means yes or no and that's all they get (preferable, in worst case also the identity of the "age verification provider" (e.g. some organization) id but under no circumstances anything more than that). Where "good enough" wrt. usability means you have to use an verification provider of your country (because what adult means differs). This solution isn't perfect, it doesn't distinguish between different countries having different ages for being adult and intentionally doesn't handle other age steps like 12+, 16+ (mainly matters for games). Honestly the only real problem I see is that in the US it can't be used to buy alcohol because for some reasons they don't allow adult to buy alcohol until 21 (but do allow them to do decisions way more dangerous then that). Except it's not really a problem as the US can define "internet adult" to be 21+, given that this is mainly needed for porn, buying alcohol etc. the US would love doing that anyway AFIK. I mean sometimes the perfect solutions is just to bothersome bother with it (the perfect solutions probably needs something like 0 knowledge proofs to preserve privacy).

d_e_solomon 4y ago
Quite a few places do age verification by requiring a small nominal fee in order to get an account. Most kids under 18 aren't going to have their own credit card or a credit card that their parents don't monitor.
- dathinab 4y ago
  I have seen this fail very hard in practice. Because most kids can get there parents credit card number, and the "small nominal fee" is often too little and also often too cryptically booked for many parents to realize what is going on or to ask their bank about it. And because it's just a "small nominal fee" many kids are also not worried about causing any harm when doing so. Additionally with the credit card e-comerce system becoming more dominant in the world it becomes increasingly more likely for not-quite adults to have something which looks like a credit card for the shop (but likely acts a bit different behind the scene). Lastly it potentially leaks _a lot_ of private information, which in some contexts is okay but in others is not. Which is also why the small nominal fee trick works, it's often not just based on "only adults have a credit card" but on "let's use the credit card number to get a lot information about the user including if they are adult".