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I don't understand why apps need to know anything about a specific age. If we have to go down this road, which I really don't, why can't we just simply have ver

I don't understand why apps need to know anything about a specific age. If we have to go down this road, which I really don't, why can't we just simply have verification whether or not an age fits within a range better yet a category. Yes, age can still be inferred, for example, under 21 or over 21.

dmantis 2mo ago
The API behaves this way: > To request a user's age range and sharing status, you call the Play Age Signals API (beta) from your app at runtime. The default age ranges the API returns are 0-12, 13-15, 16-17, and 18+, but you can receive custom age ranges. https://developer.android.com/google/play/age-signals/use-age-signals-api https://developer.android.com/google/play/age-signals/use-ag... But I don't find it any better. I don't see any viable reason to provide identification to my phone's OS. If a parent buys a phone for their child, they can already set up parental controls before handing it over. I wish Motorola all the best with their GrapheneOS partnership.
- inigyou 2mo ago
  You can also get GrapheneOS right now on Google-branded hardware, which is expensive but not enshittified.
  - dmantis 2mo ago
    True. Though I have mixed feelings buying new pixel from Google after all these actions.
    - theandrewbailey 2mo ago
      Then buy a used or open box one. There's plenty of people who try switching to Android and buy Pixels, but go back to their iPhones in a week.
    - inigyou 2mo ago
      I don't. When they start making shit hardware, stop buying their hardware. As long as it's good, buy it. That's a free market price signal.
      - r_lee 2mo ago
        I don't think there's enough GrapheneOS users to make a 'free market price signal' here
        inigyou 2mo ago
        I'm going to stop visiting the restaurant that makes the best food to spite them because I don't like their delivery policies, even though I'm going to eat inside.
  - gruez 2mo ago
    >which is expensive The rumored Motorola devices are even more expensive. It's the signature and some foldables, all in the 1000+ MSRP range. At least with pixels you can get the a series for as little as 400 on sale.
    - superloika 2mo ago
      If you buy one of the Motorola Grapheneos phones, you're gonna be marked. You will stand out in the crowd. It has happened before and will happen more frequently as the world becomes more authoritarian.
      - inigyou 2mo ago
        Yes, people can tell a phone is running Graphene. They just can't get in.
      - dmantis 2mo ago
        On the other hand, privacy becomes a luxury. People love signaling their status and standing out from the crowd. Entire car and clothing brands exist solely because of that. And if enough people stand out, it doesn't matter anymore.
      - iamnothere 2mo ago
        Oh but “the government already knows everything” as all the other privacy doomers like to say. “They” can probably already predict what phone you’re going to buy and what you’re going to eat for lunch, right? So why worry about this?
  - goda90 2mo ago
    LineageOS is still a thing too.
    - velocity3230 2mo ago
      But not in the same league as GrapheneOS.
jasonvorhe 2mo ago
Because it's not about age at all. That's just ruse to get a lever to lock people out of their devices if they don't behave.
- user43928 2mo ago
  How would that make sense? If anything, I would imagine that Google's changes are motivated by driving traffic to their Google Play Store, where they make billions in commissions. Once this framework is in place for the Google Play Store, perhaps they can lobby for strict age verification laws, and then tell developers who publish outside of Google Play that they are responsible for compliance themselves.
  - shevy-java 2mo ago
    It makes total sense. You here assume that this is only driven by Google. Once you include state actors, suddenly it makes sense. They gather more data now. Only verified users will be able to use the internet in unrestricted ways - that is what is new.
    - user43928 2mo ago
      When there is a clear motivation to protect a $50B/year revenue stream, that seems to be the more likely explanation. If it appeals to politicians who view "protect the children" and surveillance positively, that is a bonus.
  - gnoll_of_gozag 2mo ago
    people on discord get sniped semi regularly by fraudulent child exploitation reports
    - warkdarrior 2mo ago
      And these Discord child exploitation reports are sent to Google? And Google enforces them by locking down the user's Android phone?
soulofmischief 2mo ago
This isn't aimed at you specifically, but I think many technologists seem to innately misunderstand the slippery slope hypothesis which helps form the bedrock of American politics. Too many seem to fall into the familiar problem-solving mode, ready to provide compromises or solutions while forgetting that once the infrastructure is in place, it can easily be modified later to undo the compromises which facilitated its acceptance in the first place. There is an inherent power asymmetry and it's not generally in favor of those building and using the infrastructure.
- shevy-java 2mo ago
  Indeed - Flock cameras showed this. They also actively undermine the US constitution. Will be interesting to see whether the remaining judges have any power to change this or whether they were also integrated into the new dictatorship model.
  - pbhjpbhj 2mo ago
    Surely it's not the camera per se, it iss the people who are installing them. One key driver is lack of efficient law enforcement. Do you force people not to give up their own liberties? In a democracy? Although better privacy laws would cut off the access of non-customers to the data of those customers devices.
    - soulofmischief 2mo ago
      So much of this discussion is moot because the point is there is a slippery slope. It doesn't matter if there's an unconstitutional war on drugs which creates distrust and massively diverts law enforcement away from serious crime and instead towards ruining the lives of poor families. It doesn't matter if we're in a new age of McCarthyism or not, or if we're in the middle of a hyperfascist political coup and I don't even feel comfortable protesting in public in my city now that people are getting 30-year felony sentences for moving boxes and the city's new cameras and police drones can track me from my home to anywhere downtown and back. These things could be true or not. It's the fact that they could be true which means that we cannot allow ourselves to slip into an unretractable surveillance capitalist hellscape. That means people must have avenues to stop things like this. Petitioning city hall doesn't seem to be working; in fact, it's waking many people up to the fact that their local governments are not working for their interests, as mayors openly discuss banning discussion about data centers. Laws exist because some people won't play nice otherwise. It is asymmetrical to put the burden of defense of liberty on the individual. The individual is the last line of defense against the government, and when it is the individual's turn to act, it's because law has already failed. We need to act, and fix the law, so that I don't have to act like a paranoid psycho around others in my life who are wholly unequipped to understand or even care about this problem.
shevy-java 2mo ago
Because it has never been merely about age only. They want to track everyone now. Age sniffing is just one additional step for forcing verification. This will continue - see how suspiciously many countries adopt new legislation. It is quite fascinating to me to see how easy it is to kill off democracies.
jeroenhd 2mo ago
Laws have been written that mandate that applications and services treat various age ranges differently. You can't serve porn to kids, kids under 15/16 have very strict privacy regulations in some areas, and certain content age ratings are an industry standard only because that was the industry way of getting out of being regulated. For kids this is a privacy risk because there are so many thresholds. Once you're above 18, all you need to care about is "are you a pensioner". Kids have been lying about their age since the dawn of the internet and people have started catching on, so now we're getting actual restrictions rather than the assertion that nobody in their right mind would click "I am 18 or older" to access a website. Californian law mandates that operating systems keep track of their users' age, so of course Android must follow. In all of the cases listed on Google's blog, though, the option to not share information and download an app that doesn't ask for your age range is still an option.

dmantis 2mo ago

The API behaves this way: > To request a user's age range and sharing status, you call the Play Age Signals API (beta) from your app at runtime. The default age ranges the API returns are 0-12, 13-15, 16-17, and 18+, but you can receive custom age ranges. https://developer.android.com/google/play/age-signals/use-age-signals-api https://developer.android.com/google/play/age-signals/use-ag... But I don't find it any better. I don't see any viable reason to provide identification to my phone's OS. If a parent buys a phone for their child, they can already set up parental controls before handing it over. I wish Motorola all the best with their GrapheneOS partnership.

inigyou 2mo ago
You can also get GrapheneOS right now on Google-branded hardware, which is expensive but not enshittified.
- dmantis 2mo ago
  True. Though I have mixed feelings buying new pixel from Google after all these actions.
  - theandrewbailey 2mo ago
    Then buy a used or open box one. There's plenty of people who try switching to Android and buy Pixels, but go back to their iPhones in a week.
  - inigyou 2mo ago
    I don't. When they start making shit hardware, stop buying their hardware. As long as it's good, buy it. That's a free market price signal.
    - r_lee 2mo ago
      I don't think there's enough GrapheneOS users to make a 'free market price signal' here
      - inigyou 2mo ago
        I'm going to stop visiting the restaurant that makes the best food to spite them because I don't like their delivery policies, even though I'm going to eat inside.
- gruez 2mo ago
  >which is expensive The rumored Motorola devices are even more expensive. It's the signature and some foldables, all in the 1000+ MSRP range. At least with pixels you can get the a series for as little as 400 on sale.
  - superloika 2mo ago
    If you buy one of the Motorola Grapheneos phones, you're gonna be marked. You will stand out in the crowd. It has happened before and will happen more frequently as the world becomes more authoritarian.
    - inigyou 2mo ago
      Yes, people can tell a phone is running Graphene. They just can't get in.
    - dmantis 2mo ago
      On the other hand, privacy becomes a luxury. People love signaling their status and standing out from the crowd. Entire car and clothing brands exist solely because of that. And if enough people stand out, it doesn't matter anymore.
    - iamnothere 2mo ago
      Oh but “the government already knows everything” as all the other privacy doomers like to say. “They” can probably already predict what phone you’re going to buy and what you’re going to eat for lunch, right? So why worry about this?
- goda90 2mo ago
  LineageOS is still a thing too.
  - velocity3230 2mo ago
    But not in the same league as GrapheneOS.

jasonvorhe 2mo ago

Because it's not about age at all. That's just ruse to get a lever to lock people out of their devices if they don't behave.

user43928 2mo ago
How would that make sense? If anything, I would imagine that Google's changes are motivated by driving traffic to their Google Play Store, where they make billions in commissions. Once this framework is in place for the Google Play Store, perhaps they can lobby for strict age verification laws, and then tell developers who publish outside of Google Play that they are responsible for compliance themselves.
- shevy-java 2mo ago
  It makes total sense. You here assume that this is only driven by Google. Once you include state actors, suddenly it makes sense. They gather more data now. Only verified users will be able to use the internet in unrestricted ways - that is what is new.
  - user43928 2mo ago
    When there is a clear motivation to protect a $50B/year revenue stream, that seems to be the more likely explanation. If it appeals to politicians who view "protect the children" and surveillance positively, that is a bonus.
- gnoll_of_gozag 2mo ago
  people on discord get sniped semi regularly by fraudulent child exploitation reports
  - warkdarrior 2mo ago
    And these Discord child exploitation reports are sent to Google? And Google enforces them by locking down the user's Android phone?

soulofmischief 2mo ago

This isn't aimed at you specifically, but I think many technologists seem to innately misunderstand the slippery slope hypothesis which helps form the bedrock of American politics. Too many seem to fall into the familiar problem-solving mode, ready to provide compromises or solutions while forgetting that once the infrastructure is in place, it can easily be modified later to undo the compromises which facilitated its acceptance in the first place. There is an inherent power asymmetry and it's not generally in favor of those building and using the infrastructure.

shevy-java 2mo ago
Indeed - Flock cameras showed this. They also actively undermine the US constitution. Will be interesting to see whether the remaining judges have any power to change this or whether they were also integrated into the new dictatorship model.
- pbhjpbhj 2mo ago
  Surely it's not the camera per se, it iss the people who are installing them. One key driver is lack of efficient law enforcement. Do you force people not to give up their own liberties? In a democracy? Although better privacy laws would cut off the access of non-customers to the data of those customers devices.
  - soulofmischief 2mo ago
    So much of this discussion is moot because the point is there is a slippery slope. It doesn't matter if there's an unconstitutional war on drugs which creates distrust and massively diverts law enforcement away from serious crime and instead towards ruining the lives of poor families. It doesn't matter if we're in a new age of McCarthyism or not, or if we're in the middle of a hyperfascist political coup and I don't even feel comfortable protesting in public in my city now that people are getting 30-year felony sentences for moving boxes and the city's new cameras and police drones can track me from my home to anywhere downtown and back. These things could be true or not. It's the fact that they could be true which means that we cannot allow ourselves to slip into an unretractable surveillance capitalist hellscape. That means people must have avenues to stop things like this. Petitioning city hall doesn't seem to be working; in fact, it's waking many people up to the fact that their local governments are not working for their interests, as mayors openly discuss banning discussion about data centers. Laws exist because some people won't play nice otherwise. It is asymmetrical to put the burden of defense of liberty on the individual. The individual is the last line of defense against the government, and when it is the individual's turn to act, it's because law has already failed. We need to act, and fix the law, so that I don't have to act like a paranoid psycho around others in my life who are wholly unequipped to understand or even care about this problem.

shevy-java 2mo ago

Because it has never been merely about age only. They want to track everyone now. Age sniffing is just one additional step for forcing verification. This will continue - see how suspiciously many countries adopt new legislation. It is quite fascinating to me to see how easy it is to kill off democracies.

jeroenhd 2mo ago

Laws have been written that mandate that applications and services treat various age ranges differently. You can't serve porn to kids, kids under 15/16 have very strict privacy regulations in some areas, and certain content age ratings are an industry standard only because that was the industry way of getting out of being regulated. For kids this is a privacy risk because there are so many thresholds. Once you're above 18, all you need to care about is "are you a pensioner". Kids have been lying about their age since the dawn of the internet and people have started catching on, so now we're getting actual restrictions rather than the assertion that nobody in their right mind would click "I am 18 or older" to access a website. Californian law mandates that operating systems keep track of their users' age, so of course Android must follow. In all of the cases listed on Google's blog, though, the option to not share information and download an app that doesn't ask for your age range is still an option.