17 ms·

But the only way to do this is to require ID checks, effectively regulating and destroying the anonymous nature of the internet (and probably unconstitutional u

• thinkingtoilet 3y ago
  > effectively regulating and destroying the anonymous nature of the internet. Not at all. Just the social media sites, which are objectively bad for kids. As an adult, you do what you want on the internet.
  • lukev 3y ago
    And what makes a site a social media site? Anywhere you can post interactive content? You do realize that laws like this would apply to sites like HN, Reddit, the comment section of every blog, and every phpBB forum you ever used? It's not just Instagram and Tiktok.
    • anonym29 3y ago
      Trying to force independently owned and operated forums to enforce laws that might not even be applicable in the country that the owners / admins live and work in is going to be about as effective as trying to force foreign VPS/server/hosting providers to delete copyrighted content from their server using laws that don't apply in their jurisdiction.
    • thinkingtoilet 3y ago
      I think a perfectly clear line could be drawn that would separate out phpBB from TikTok very easily. I genuinely don't understand this comment, we shouldn't do it because it's hard or the results might be imperfect?
      • lukev 3y ago
        Kids want to communicate. Whether it's TikTok, Discord, phpBB, chatting in Roblox or Minecraft, they will if they can. If we want to "ban social media" we'll need a consistent set of guidelines about what counts as social media and what doesn't, and what exactly the harms are so they can be avoided. I don't believe that's as easy as you think.
      • CalRobert 3y ago
        Any clear line would be gamed pretty quickly I imagine.
      • woodruffw 3y ago
        I think your comment would be much stronger if you laid out precisely what you think that line would be. Laws do not have to be perfect to be good, but they do have to be workable. It's not clear that there's a working definition of "social media" that includes both TikTok and Reddit but doesn't include random forums.
        • thinkingtoilet 3y ago
          So if a random person on the internet doesn't have a perfect solution then it shouldn't be considered?
          • lazyasciiart 3y ago
            Their opinion that it would be straightforward shouldn’t be considered.
          • woodruffw 3y ago
            This is not a charitable reading. Nobody is asking for a perfect solution; it is reasonable to demonstrate some prior consideration for the ways in which most solutions are dangerously imperfect.
      • chasd00 3y ago
        To me the issue is it’s a waste of government and waste of time. Parental controls already exist on all devices. The answer to every problem can’t be “more government, more laws”.
• JeremyNT 3y ago
  Yes, this isn't the right solution. The power needs to be given to the users. A better solution is more robust device management, with control given to the device owner (read: the parent). The missing legislative piece is mandating that social media companies need to respond differently when the user agent tells them what to send. I should be able to take my daughter's phone (which I own), set an option somewhere that indicates "this user is a minor," and with every HTTP request it makes it sets e.g. an OMIT_ADULT_CONTENT header. Site owners simply respond differently when they see this.
  • notsound 3y ago
    Another option that allows for better privacy and versatility is the website setting a MIN_USER_AGE header based on IP geolocation.
    • Terr_ 3y ago
      Geolocation to that degree not that reliable and not necessarily 1:1 with jurisdiction or parental intent. If we're already trusting a parental-locked device to report minor-status, then it's trivial to also have it identify what jurisdiction/ruleset exists, or some finer-grained model of what shouldn't work. In either case, we have the problem of how to model things like "in the Flub province of the nation of Elbonia children below 150.5 months may not see media containing exposed ankles". OK, maybe not quite that bad, but the line needs to be drawn somewhere.
  • Terr_ 3y ago
    Exactly, any design for this stuff requires parental-involvement because every approach without it is either (A) uselessly-weak or (B) creepy-Orwellian. If we assume parents are involved enough to "buy the thingy that advertises a parental lock", then a whole bunch of less-dumb options become available... And more of the costs of the system will be borne by the people (or at least groups) that are utilizing it.
  • cmiles74 3y ago
    Emancipation of children is also a thing, where a minor may petition the court to be treated as an adult. This also falls afoul of a blanket age restriction. https://jeannecolemanlaw.com/the-legal-emancipation-of-minors-under-florida-statutory-law/ https://jeannecolemanlaw.com/the-legal-emancipation-of-minor...
• jlokier 3y ago
  > But the only way to do this is to require ID checks, effectively regulating and destroying the anonymous nature of the internet That seems intuitive, but it's not actually true. I suggest looking up zero-knowledge proofs. Using modern cryptography, it is easy to send a machine-generated proof to your social media provider that your government-provided ID says your age is ≥ 16, without revealing anything else about you to the service provider (not even your age), and without having to communicate with the government either. The government doesn't learn which web sites you visit, and the web sites don't learn anything about you other than you are certified to be age ≥ 16. The proofs are unique to each site, so web sites can't use them to collude with each other. That kind of "smart ID" doesn't have to be with the government, although that's often a natural starting point for ID information. There are methods which do the same based on a consensus of people and entities that know you, for example. That might be better from a human rights perspective, given how many people do not have citizenship rights. > (and probably unconstitutional under the First Amendment, to boot.) If it would be unconstitutional to require identity-revealing or age-revealing ID checks for social media, that's all the more reason to investigate modern technical solutions we have to those problems.
  • lukev 3y ago
    It'd be cool if any of the proposed bills actually suggested something like this. They do not. They specify an ID check.
  • delichon 3y ago
    [flagged]
    • freetanga 3y ago
      You are free to express yourself in a park. You are not free to enter the White House to express yourself. Enforcing a property owners right to refuse entry (digital or physical) does not prevent you from expressing yourself, but rather from doing it that specific property. Social Networks are not a public space
    • IanCal 3y ago
• einpoklum 3y ago
  > destroying the anonymous nature of the internet Aren't the really problematic social networks the ones where you've lost your privacy and anonymity long ago and are being tracked and mined like crazy?
  • lukev 3y ago
    That's like saying "80% of the internet has gone to shit, might as well destroy the remaining good 20%".
    • jf22 3y ago
      I don't think it's like saying that at all.
• paulddraper 3y ago
  > privacy-destroying We ARE talking about social media. Like, the least private software on the planet.
• blitz_skull 3y ago
  You know, I'm not really sure that requiring IDs for access to porn / social media is a terrible idea. Sure it's been anonymous and free since the advent of the internet, but perhaps it's time to change that. After all, we don't allow a kid into a brothel or allow them to engage in prostitution (for good reasons), and porn is equally destructive. But with the topic at hand being social media, I think a lot of the same issues and solutions apply. It's harmful to allow kids to interact with anyone and everyone at any given time. Boundaries are healthy. Aaaaand, finally there's much less destruction of human livelihood by guns than both of the aforementioned topics if we measure "destruction" by "living a significantly impoverished life from the standard of emotional and mental wellbeing". I doubt we could even get hard numbers on the number of marriages destroyed by pornography, which yield broken households, which yield countless emotional and mental problems. So, no, guns aren't something we should discuss first. Also, guns have utility including but not limited to defending yourself and your family. Porn has absolutely zero utility, and social media is pretty damn close, but not zero utility.
  • dsign 3y ago
    [dead]
  • tempestn 3y ago
    You think watching porn is equally destructive to engaging in prostitution? I'd hate to see what kind of porn you're watching.
    • blitz_skull 3y ago
      I think you’re vastly underestimating the destructive nature of porn. I’m no longer watching porn, by the grace of God.
  • diputsmonro 3y ago
    The biggest problem with this is how we would define "porn". Some states are currently redefining the existence of a transgender person in public as an inherently lewd act equivalent to indecent exposure. I have no doubt that if your proposal were to pass that there would be significant efforts from extremist conservatives to censor LGBT+ communities online by labeling sex education or mere discussion of our lives as pornographic. How are LGBT+ people supposed to live if our very existence is considered impolite? Nevermind the fact that the existence of a government database of all the (potentially weird) porn you look at is a gold mine for anyone who wants to blackmail or pressure you into silence. The horrors and dangers of porn are squarely a domestic and family issue. The government does not need to come into my bedroom and look over my shoulder.
• paulddraper 3y ago
  > destroying the anonymous nature of the internet (and probably unconstitutional under the First Amendment, to boot.) The First Amendment guarantees free expression, not anonymous expression. For example, there are federal requirements for identification for political messages. [1] These requirements do not violate the First Amendment. [1] https://www.fec.gov/help-candidates-and-committees/advertising-and-disclaimers/ https://www.fec.gov/help-candidates-and-committees/advertisi...
  • o11c 3y ago
    In particular, "anonymous speech is required if you want to have free speech" is actually a very niche position, not a mainstream one. It just happens to be widely spammed in certain online cultures.
    • paulddraper 3y ago
      Correct. I am staunch believer in the moral and societal good of free speech. Anonymous speech is far more dubious. Like, protests seem valuable. Protests while wearing robes and masks however...
      • TillE 3y ago
        > Protests while wearing robes and masks however This is absolutely permitted in America. It is illegal in countries like Germany which have no strong free speech protections.
        • jonathankoren 3y ago
          No. It is not "absolutely permitted in America". They're Klan Acts, because a bunch of guys in masks and robes marching through is obviously a threat of violence. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-mask_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-mask_law
          • chasd00 3y ago
• Terr_ 3y ago
  > But the only way to do this is to require ID checks Not necessarily, consider the counterexample of devices with parental-controls which--when locked--will always send a "this person is a minor" header. (Or "this person hits the following jurisdictional age-categories", or some blend of enough detail to be internationally useful and little-enough to be reasonably private and not-insane to obey.) That would mostly puts control into the hands of parents, at the expense of sites needing some kind of code-library that can spit out a "block or not" result.
• RandallBrown 3y ago
  The definition of "social media" in this bill actually seems to exempt anonymous social networks since it requires the site "Allows an account holder to interact with or track other account holders".
• giantg2 3y ago
  "probably unconstitutional under the First Amendment, to boot" Probably not. Minors have all sorts of restrictions on rights, including first amendment restrictions such as in schools. "(And if it is, let's start talking about gun ownership first...)" Are you advocating for removing ID checks for this? If not, it seems that this point actually works against your argument. Not saying that I agree with a ban, but your arguments against it don't really stand.
• qwertox 3y ago
  Lately I'm repeatedly reminded of how in Ecuador citizens, when interviewed during a protest, see it as a normal thing to tell their name as well as their personal ID number into the camera when also speaking about their position in regards of the protest. They stand to what they are saying without hiding. Since about half a year I've noticed the German Twitter section getting sunk in hate posts, people disrespecting each other, ranting about politicians or ways of thinking, but being really hateful. It's horrible. I've adblocked the "Trending" section away, because its the door to this horrible place where people don't have anything good to share anymore but disrespect and hate. This made me think about what we're really in need for, at least here in Germany, is a Twitter alternative, where people register by using their eID and can only post by using their real name. Have something mean to say? Say it, but attach your name to it. This anonymity in social media is really harming German society, at least as soon as politics are involved. I don't know exactly how it is in the US but apparently it isn't as bad as here, at least judging from the trending topics in the US and skimming through the posts.
  • Kye 3y ago
    People have zero qualms about being absolute ghouls under their wallet names. The people with the most power in society don't need anonymity. The people with the least often can't safely express themselves without it. Also: https://theconversation.com/online-anonymity-study-found-stable-pseudonyms-created-a-more-civil-environment-than-real-user-names-171374 https://theconversation.com/online-anonymity-study-found-sta... >> "What matters, it seems, is not so much whether you are commenting anonymously, but whether you are invested in your persona and accountable for its behaviour in that particular forum. There seems to be value in enabling people to speak on forums without their comments being connected, via their real names, to other contexts. The online comment management company Disqus, in a similar vein, found that comments made under conditions of durable pseudonymity were rated by other users as having the highest quality. "
    • qwertox 3y ago
      There are two points which matter: - No more bots or fake propaganda accounts. - Illegal content, such as insults or the like, will not get published. And if it does, it will have direct consequences. I'm also not tending towards a requirement to have all social networks ID'd, but I think that a Twitter alternative which enables a more serious discussion should exist. A place where politicians and journalists or just citizens can post their content and get commented on it, without all that extreme toxicity from Twitter.
• giancarlostoro 3y ago
  > But the only way to do this is to require ID checks COPPA has entered the building. If you're under 13 and a platform finds out, they'll usually ban you until you prove that you're not under 13 (via ID) or can provide signed forms from your parent / legal guardian. I've seen dozens of people if not more over the years banned from various platforms over this. We're talking Reddit, Facebook, Discord and so on. I get what you're saying, but it kind of is a thing already, all one has to do is raise the age limit from 13 to say... 16 and voila.
  • woodruffw 3y ago
    "Finds out" is the operative part. COPPA is not a proactive requirement; it's a reactive one. Proactive legislation is a newer harm that can't easily be predicted based on past experiences with reactive laws.
    • giancarlostoro 3y ago
      Indeed, nothing is stopping said companies from scanning and assessing age of a user uploading selfies though. This is allegedly something that TikTok does. My point being, the framework is there, and then people actually report minors, the companies have to take it seriously, or face serious legal consequences.
      • woodruffw 3y ago
        How do you know the selfie is from the "primary" user? And how do you know they're underage, versus being a chubby-faced 18 year old (like yours truly was?)
        • giancarlostoro 3y ago
          It doesn't matter to the platform, mind you, I've seen people abuse this. They will deactivate the account and require ID.
• NoMoreNicksLeft 3y ago
  >But the only way to do this is to require ID checks, effectively regulating and destroying the anonymous nature of the internet Ban portable electronics for children. Demand that law enforcement intervene any time it's spotted in the wild. If you still insist that children be allowed phones, dumb flip phones for them. It could be done if there was the will to do it, it just won't be done.
• slily 3y ago
  People can post all kinds of illegal things online and no one is suggesting that content should be approved before it can be visible on the Internet. It doesn't have to be strictly enforced to act as a deterrent. How effective of a deterrent it would be has yet to be seen.
• 1vuio0pswjnm7 3y ago
  How many social media users who create accounts and "sign in" are "anonymous". How would targeted advertising work if the website did not "know" their ages and other demographic information about them. Are the social media companies lying to advertisers by telling them they can target persons in a certain age bracket.
• huytersd 3y ago
  Ah so be it. I don’t care much for the things that come from anonymous culture. I want gatekeepers. This tyranny of the stupid online is pretty tiresome.
• spogbiper 3y ago
  I propose the Leisure Suit Larry method. Just make users answer some outdated trivia questions that only olds will know when they sign up for an account.
  • badpun 3y ago
    In the Internet era, the answers will just be googleable. People wil quickly compile a page with all possible questions and with answers to them.
    • jonathankoren 3y ago
      But with ChatGPT, all the answers will be wrong.
• onion2k 3y ago
  effectively regulating and destroying the anonymous nature of the internet Social media is on the internet. It is not the internet.
• dustedcodes 3y ago
  [flagged]
  • Buttons840 3y ago
    Government knows best when it comes to minors, right? And all of us need to have our government papers ready if we want to participate in the most important forum of communication of our time. Talk about power imbalance. > who can’t even articulate the difference between man and woman Can you articulate that difference? Personally, I'd expect a more complete definition from a kid today than I would from a conservative adult. For example, my dad might refer to DNA when explaining the difference between a man and a woman, and he would also confidently say he's a man (I mean, he is my dad), but since he's never had a DNA test, how can he be sure? It's obviously about more than DNA. My mom might say a woman is someone who can have children, but what about women who cannot have children, are they not women? Etc.
  • I_am_uncreative 3y ago
    > who can’t even articulate the difference between man and woman Ahh, you're one of those people. I now can just discount everything you said.
• dathinab 3y ago
  > effectively regulating and destroying the anonymous nature of the internet Technically you can make that work without issues (You only need to prove your age not your identity, something which can reasonably be archived without leaking your identity). There are just two practical issues: - companies, government and state (at least US police & spy agencies) will try to undermine any afford to create a reasonable anonymous - it only technically works if a "reasonable degree" of proof is "good enough", i.e. it's must be fine that a hacker can create a (illegal?) tool with which a child could pretend to be 16+, e.g. by proxing the age check to a hacked device of an adult. Heck it should be fine if a check can be tricked by using the parents passport or phone. I mean it's an 16+ check, there really isn't much of a reason why it isn't okay to have a system which is only "good enough". But lawmakers will try nonsense. Interestingly this is more a problem for the US then some other states AFIK due to how 1) you can't expect everyone 18+ to have an id and everyone 16+ to be able to easily get one (a bunch of countries have owing (not carrying) id requirements without it being a privacy issue. 2) Terrible consumer protection making it practically nearly impossible to create a privacy preserving system even if government and state agencies do not meddle. Similar if there wouldn't be the issue with passports in US it probably wouldn't touch the First Amendment as it in the end protects less then a lot of people believe it does.
• ttt3ts 3y ago
  > effectively regulating and destroying the anonymous nature of the internet The bulk of the internet has not been anonymous for a while. Facebook requires an id already, Google tracks you using Google and the OS, reddit is tightening to control bots, amazon requires a phone number. Think about it. What portion of your activities day to day on the Internet are anonymous? Now try to do them anonymously. It isn't practical/possible anymore and the internet of yesteryear is gone.
• terpimost 3y ago
  It is pretty hard to give access to youtube to your kid with an account where age is stated. Yes kids can open browser in private mode… but they rarely do because it is a friction. If every social media would be moved to adult category the current rules in operating systems would do a good job. I am not sure about 16 years ( i would support it as a father )… but up to 13-14 feels appropriate, there is PG-13
• ZunarJ5 3y ago
  We say this is the only way, but what about regulating these companies properly???
  • zamadatix 3y ago
    "Regulating them properly" could mean a lot of things to a lot of people. Do you mean e.g. just not allowing porn on the internet or do you mean e.g. just not requiring identification verification? If neither, what way of regulation that allows distinction without banning content or identifying users?
    • ZunarJ5 3y ago
      Putting conditions on the company so that they do not even risk this in the first place, e.g. moderation, a demand to make tools to protect children, there are a lot of different things and prohibition is the least likely to work at any level. You can look at any issue in history with prohibition and see what that amounts to.
• forgetfreeman 3y ago
  The internet has not been anonymous in fact or theory for decades now, and if you think the government can't get your complete browsing history on a whim I'm guessing you haven't paid any attention to the news about NSA buying user data bundles from online brokers. That said, "muh freedoms" is hardly a quality argument in the face of the widely documented pervasive harms caused to children by exposure to social media. The logical extreme of your position would be to declare smoking in public a form of self-expression and then demand age limits be removed for the sale of tobacco products because First Amendment. :P
  • hobs 3y ago
    As the OP said, if freedoms are not a quality argument then we can rid ourselves of millions of guns, but this is a non-starter for the freedom crowd.
    • forgetfreeman 3y ago
      Ironically the "freedom crowd" are also statistically significantly more likely to get shot by their own toddlers accidentally so I'm not convinced they represent a pool of quality decision-making or grounded worldview. It's interesting how quickly any discussion of potential solutions to real-world problems gets chucked out the window the second someone says "freedom".
• stevage 3y ago
  >It's not that anyone wants kids to have easy access to this stuff, but that any of these laws will either be (a) unenforceable and useless, or (b) draconian and privacy-destroying. Surely not. Imagine: government sells proof of age cards. They contain your name, and a unique identifier. Each time you sign up to a service, you enter your name and ID. The service can verify with the government that your age is what it needs to be for the service. There are laws that state that you can't store that ID or use it for any other purpose. Doesn't seem impossible.
  • throwaway421967 3y ago
    - Would only work if the government, does not have access to the reverse mapping. (otherwise law enforcement will eventually expand to get its hands on it) - It will likely be phished very quickly (and you'd have no way of knowing since no one is storing it). (making it short lived, means u'd have to announce tot he goverment eveytime u want to watch porn) - Eventually there will be dumps of ids, like there are dumps of premium porn accounts now Still doesn't do anything about foreign websites.
• pokstad 3y ago
  Alcohol and tobacco websites have been doing fine without checking IDs.
• jakderrida 3y ago
  > It's the same problem with requiring age verification for porn. It's not that anyone wants kids to have easy access to this stuff I do. Anything to avoid "the talk", tbh. I grew up Catholic. I never had "the talk". I don't even know where to start. Blow jobs?
• bimguy 3y ago
  "Unconstitutional" arguments only go so far. I am not America (I'm a proud Australian) so I can easily see the incredibly obvious and ridiculous destruction "freedom" in your country entails. Anonymity services can still exist without fostering an environment to addict children and young adults to social media or a device... and without your precious "rights" being taken away.
• Beldin 3y ago
  > But the only way to do this is to require ID checks, No, it isn't. Check out Yivi [1]. Its fundamental premise is to not reveal your attributes. It's based on academic work into (a.o.) attribute-based encryption. The professor then took this a step further and spun off a (no profit) foundation to expand and govern this idea. [1] https://privacybydesign.foundation/irma-explanation/ https://privacybydesign.foundation/irma-explanation/
• lelanthran 3y ago
  > It's the same problem with requiring age verification for porn. It's not that anyone wants kids to have easy access to this stuff, Depends on the argument being made, on the ideology of the audience, on the current norms, etc. I had an exchange here on HN some time back (topic was about schools removing certain books from their libraries), and very many people in support of those books, which dealt with gender-identity and sexual orientation, also supported outright porn (the example I used was pornhub) for kids of all ages as long as those books with pictures (not photos) of male-male sexual intercourse could stay in the library. Right now, if you made the argument "There are some things kids below $AGE shouldn't be exposed to", you'll still get some (vocal) minority disagreeing because: 1. They feel that what $AGE kids get exposed to should be out of the parent's hands ("Should we allow parents to hide evolution from their children?", "Should we allow parents to hide transgenderism from their children?") 2. They know that, especially with young children, they will lose their chance to imprint a norm on the child if they are prevented from distributing specific material to young children. In the case of sex and sexual education, there is currently a huge push for specific thoughts to be normalised, and unfortunately if it means that graphic sexual depictions are made to children, so be it. The majority is rarely so vocal about things they consider "common sense", like no access to pornhub for 10 year olds.
• beretguy 3y ago
  > But the only way to do this is to require ID checks, effectively regulating and destroying the anonymous nature of the internet Hopefully this will reduce amount of people using social media.