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A drop down list of birth dates/years "works" for most age restricted sites - I guess the logic is that if a user is lying about their age, it's not the sites p

A drop down list of birth dates/years "works" for most age restricted sites - I guess the logic is that if a user is lying about their age, it's not the sites problem. Article states that sites must demonstrate they are taking reasonable measures to enforce this though - a lot will come down as to how courts interpret that. If they go to the extremes of the KYC laws in australia I imagine a significant fraction of adults will not want to verify their age.

throwaway2037 2y ago
> extremes of the KYC laws in australia Can you provide more details about this statement? I never heard anything about it on HN discussions.
- jeeeb 2y ago
  I’m not sure how unusual it is internationally but KYC laws in Australia will generally require 100 points of identification, usually satisfied by showing your passport and drivers license. Other options include recent utility bills, your birth certificate, medicare card etc. The system wasn’t really designed for the internet era and I think a lot of people would not be happy about handing all the personal info over to TikTok or Facebook
alkonaut 2y ago
> I guess the logic is that if a user is lying about their age, it's not the sites problem. If the law is to have any teeth at all, it should be the problem of the service provider. Say for example that a banned feature for minors is having media feeds based on past watching behavior. Lacking a reliable age verification it's simple for social media companies to remove the feature entirely for all users, if it's unreasonable or impossible for them to implement age verification.
whstl 2y ago
As much as I am grateful for most of GDPR, it has shown that leaving the implementation of anything to websites is a recipe for disaster. It's gonna be cookie banners 2.0. I bet a lot will just ask for a credit card number, like in those old scam fake-porn websites from the late 90s/early 2000s.

throwaway2037 2y ago

> extremes of the KYC laws in australia Can you provide more details about this statement? I never heard anything about it on HN discussions.

jeeeb 2y ago
I’m not sure how unusual it is internationally but KYC laws in Australia will generally require 100 points of identification, usually satisfied by showing your passport and drivers license. Other options include recent utility bills, your birth certificate, medicare card etc. The system wasn’t really designed for the internet era and I think a lot of people would not be happy about handing all the personal info over to TikTok or Facebook

alkonaut 2y ago

> I guess the logic is that if a user is lying about their age, it's not the sites problem. If the law is to have any teeth at all, it should be the problem of the service provider. Say for example that a banned feature for minors is having media feeds based on past watching behavior. Lacking a reliable age verification it's simple for social media companies to remove the feature entirely for all users, if it's unreasonable or impossible for them to implement age verification.

whstl 2y ago

As much as I am grateful for most of GDPR, it has shown that leaving the implementation of anything to websites is a recipe for disaster. It's gonna be cookie banners 2.0. I bet a lot will just ask for a credit card number, like in those old scam fake-porn websites from the late 90s/early 2000s.