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At glance this looks reasonable but how do you enforce that kids connection always goes through the parents control? You are just moving the verification point

by mrtksn 2mo ago

At glance this looks reasonable but how do you enforce that kids connection always goes through the parents control? You are just moving the verification point to another gate, it means that no anonymous connections are possible anymore to the entire Internet because we want to allow parents to control their kids. You want to use your friends Wi-Fi? Now that requires full identification so that we know that its not some kid trying to look at stuff their parents don't allow. Want to connect your cat toilet to the internet? Well, we will need to either cryptographically identify the device or attach its ID to your real ID because we don't want to allow kids look at stuff their parents did not allow and this might just be a proxy device for some nerdy 14 y/o. Want to use your old PC? Sorry that's not possible, now all devices that connect to the internet require biometric identification because we can't tell if this is an adult or just some kid using a legacy device to look at stuff their parents don't allow.

1718627440 2mo ago
No, the point was that the actual decision happens client side and under the control of the sysadmin (the parent). > You are just moving the verification point to another gate Yeah, the gate being the decision of legal entities of age, aka. adults. > You want to use your friends, Wi-Fi? That would still do whatever your parent decided for you. > Want to connect your can toilet to the internet? Whether the toilet can connect to the network, is the decision of the network administrator, and toilets don't contain UAs, so that wouldn't even have software on them, where you could configure such behaviour.
- mrtksn 2mo ago
  You're making the mistake of assuming that every kid has access to identified device and that device is under parent control. You can't make this assumption because that's not true. It might be true for some middle class helicopter parents that have iPhones and time to manage and keep it under strict control but there are non-middle class kids out there who just use whatever device they can get their hands on and their parens neither have time nor ability to control that.
  - vorpalhex 2mo ago
    That's a parent issue, the same as if their kid has a secret stash of cocaine or enjoys dancing in traffic. No technical measure can fix stupid.
    - mrtksn 2mo ago
      That's not parents issue. That's why we go after people who sell or give drugs to kids. Is a serious offense, we don't wave our hands and say its parents problem and not drugging kids is a popular policy unlike drug enforcement for adults.
      - vorpalhex 2mo ago
        Everything is a parents issue. If you are depending on the police to keep your kid from doing drugs, you have failed as a parent. I promise you, your kid can locate drugs better than the cops can arrest low level dealers. You as a parent need to teach your kid how to behave (mostly through things like teaching ethics and morals) not by running a safe prison until your kid is 18. And yes, I am a parent of multiple kids.
        1718627440 2mo ago
        > not by running a safe prison until your kid is 18. And in addition, such an approach, will not lead to a child magically becoming an adult all of a sudden when they turn 18.
        mrtksn 2mo ago
        I agree, however the problem is that large number of parents can't do that and it becomes a societal issue. That's why we are talking about that, otherwise it would have been private family issue. Drugs, alcohol, teen pregnancy and now social media has become societal issue as enough parents failed to control their kids actions or development.
        wowyouredumb 2mo ago
- trollbridge 2mo ago
  There are definitely toilets that have UAs.
  - KPGv2 2mo ago
    all toilets are UA assuming the first word stands for a relative orientation, and the second stands for a slang word for butt
    - 1718627440 2mo ago
      They are also User Agents, in that they interface with the user, process input from them, and pass it to the network. But that network isn't based on electricity and does not primarily transmit information, so it is not the kind of UA to a network, we want to introduce parental controls for.
RandomGerm4n 2mo ago
The answer is quite simple. You just don't verify it. The point isn’t to verify the age but to set the age on the device itself. If the parents set the age on the cell phone or computer, that setting is then used as the basis. The operating systems can be configured so that only the device administrator can change the age. Systemd already has a field for storing the age, which programs can read. If the child doesn’t know the root password for the laptop, they can’t change the age. If they do manage to get around that, well, so be it. The solution doesn’t have to be perfect because it would still be an improvement over the current situation without restricting adults in any way.
- izend 2mo ago
  Are you a parent? I have personally used the parental controls on Android, iOS and ChromeOS and to be honest they are terrible. Issues with syncing changes, the terrible UX for parental access control (iOS...), issues around audit/access logs, issues around prompting the parent for access. I am honestly shocked that Apple known for its polished experience hasn't been forced by angry parents. My daughter's school actually advised parents to not enable parental controls on her ChromeBook because it would interfere with the school's education websites but my daughter was caught playing web games in class so we decided to lock her down anyways.
  - miohtama 2mo ago
    Being parent is not supposed to be easy
    - dnbfbfhf 2mo ago
      [flagged]
  - tempfile 2mo ago
    Parental controls on devices are not hard because they are intrinsically hard. The companies just do not care about them, because nobody has forced them to be implemented sensibly. There is absolutely zero reason an Android device could not have a shiny button saying "Kid's device" when you set it up and never need configuring again. So this is not a criticism of the approach, and only a criticism of the companies.
wowyouredumb 2mo ago
> At glance this looks reasonable but how do you enforce that kids connection always goes through the parents control? Because the parent is there to parent them? Somehow I (and presumably almost everyone here) grew up with unfettered access to the Internet until now. Your kid isn't my kid, and someone relying on a computer to parent their children shouldn't ruin computers for everyone.
newsoftheday 2mo ago
> At glance this looks reasonable but how do you enforce that kids connection always goes through the parents control? YouTube doesn't, the parent does. > no anonymous connections are possible anymore to the entire Internet Adults would not be blocked if I understand the GP comment. It's an age recommendation and it's up to the parent's to control it for their kids. > we want to allow parents to control their kids. Yes. Google, YouTube, AI in general will never be a replacement for parenting and they should drop the charade now.
patmorgan23 2mo ago
"how do you enforce that kids connection always goes to the parents" That's the thing. You don't. It's the parents job to monitor how their children use the Internet.
jolmg 2mo ago
> but how do you enforce that kids connection always goes through the parents control? Because the devices they're given by their parents should be administered by their parents. The minors wouldn't have administrative control over their devices at all. > You want to use your friends Wi-Fi? Now that requires full identification so that we know that its not some kid The device wouldn't care how the connection to the internet is made. It ultimately obeys the parents' settings. The Wi-Fi doesn't need to care either way. > You are just moving the verification point to another gate, it means that no anonymous connections are possible anymore to the entire Internet because we want to allow parents to control their kids. Not at all. This wouldn't affect people without parental controls on their device at all. They'd be able to have anonymous connections as they do now. The only difference from the server-side is adding some special path /.well-known/parental-info.json or an HTTP header to responses that would indicate what's on the page from a parental perspective, so the device can make a decision whether to display based on its parental settings.

by mrtksn 2mo ago

1718627440 2mo ago

No, the point was that the actual decision happens client side and under the control of the sysadmin (the parent). > You are just moving the verification point to another gate Yeah, the gate being the decision of legal entities of age, aka. adults. > You want to use your friends, Wi-Fi? That would still do whatever your parent decided for you. > Want to connect your can toilet to the internet? Whether the toilet can connect to the network, is the decision of the network administrator, and toilets don't contain UAs, so that wouldn't even have software on them, where you could configure such behaviour.

mrtksn 2mo ago
You're making the mistake of assuming that every kid has access to identified device and that device is under parent control. You can't make this assumption because that's not true. It might be true for some middle class helicopter parents that have iPhones and time to manage and keep it under strict control but there are non-middle class kids out there who just use whatever device they can get their hands on and their parens neither have time nor ability to control that.
- vorpalhex 2mo ago
  That's a parent issue, the same as if their kid has a secret stash of cocaine or enjoys dancing in traffic. No technical measure can fix stupid.
  - mrtksn 2mo ago
    That's not parents issue. That's why we go after people who sell or give drugs to kids. Is a serious offense, we don't wave our hands and say its parents problem and not drugging kids is a popular policy unlike drug enforcement for adults.
    - vorpalhex 2mo ago
      Everything is a parents issue. If you are depending on the police to keep your kid from doing drugs, you have failed as a parent. I promise you, your kid can locate drugs better than the cops can arrest low level dealers. You as a parent need to teach your kid how to behave (mostly through things like teaching ethics and morals) not by running a safe prison until your kid is 18. And yes, I am a parent of multiple kids.
      - 1718627440 2mo ago
        > not by running a safe prison until your kid is 18. And in addition, such an approach, will not lead to a child magically becoming an adult all of a sudden when they turn 18.
      - mrtksn 2mo ago
        I agree, however the problem is that large number of parents can't do that and it becomes a societal issue. That's why we are talking about that, otherwise it would have been private family issue. Drugs, alcohol, teen pregnancy and now social media has become societal issue as enough parents failed to control their kids actions or development.
        wowyouredumb 2mo ago
trollbridge 2mo ago
There are definitely toilets that have UAs.
- KPGv2 2mo ago
  all toilets are UA assuming the first word stands for a relative orientation, and the second stands for a slang word for butt
  - 1718627440 2mo ago
    They are also User Agents, in that they interface with the user, process input from them, and pass it to the network. But that network isn't based on electricity and does not primarily transmit information, so it is not the kind of UA to a network, we want to introduce parental controls for.

RandomGerm4n 2mo ago

The answer is quite simple. You just don't verify it. The point isn’t to verify the age but to set the age on the device itself. If the parents set the age on the cell phone or computer, that setting is then used as the basis. The operating systems can be configured so that only the device administrator can change the age. Systemd already has a field for storing the age, which programs can read. If the child doesn’t know the root password for the laptop, they can’t change the age. If they do manage to get around that, well, so be it. The solution doesn’t have to be perfect because it would still be an improvement over the current situation without restricting adults in any way.

izend 2mo ago
Are you a parent? I have personally used the parental controls on Android, iOS and ChromeOS and to be honest they are terrible. Issues with syncing changes, the terrible UX for parental access control (iOS...), issues around audit/access logs, issues around prompting the parent for access. I am honestly shocked that Apple known for its polished experience hasn't been forced by angry parents. My daughter's school actually advised parents to not enable parental controls on her ChromeBook because it would interfere with the school's education websites but my daughter was caught playing web games in class so we decided to lock her down anyways.
- miohtama 2mo ago
  Being parent is not supposed to be easy
  - dnbfbfhf 2mo ago
    [flagged]
- tempfile 2mo ago
  Parental controls on devices are not hard because they are intrinsically hard. The companies just do not care about them, because nobody has forced them to be implemented sensibly. There is absolutely zero reason an Android device could not have a shiny button saying "Kid's device" when you set it up and never need configuring again. So this is not a criticism of the approach, and only a criticism of the companies.

wowyouredumb 2mo ago

> At glance this looks reasonable but how do you enforce that kids connection always goes through the parents control? Because the parent is there to parent them? Somehow I (and presumably almost everyone here) grew up with unfettered access to the Internet until now. Your kid isn't my kid, and someone relying on a computer to parent their children shouldn't ruin computers for everyone.

newsoftheday 2mo ago

> At glance this looks reasonable but how do you enforce that kids connection always goes through the parents control? YouTube doesn't, the parent does. > no anonymous connections are possible anymore to the entire Internet Adults would not be blocked if I understand the GP comment. It's an age recommendation and it's up to the parent's to control it for their kids. > we want to allow parents to control their kids. Yes. Google, YouTube, AI in general will never be a replacement for parenting and they should drop the charade now.

patmorgan23 2mo ago

"how do you enforce that kids connection always goes to the parents" That's the thing. You don't. It's the parents job to monitor how their children use the Internet.

jolmg 2mo ago

> but how do you enforce that kids connection always goes through the parents control? Because the devices they're given by their parents should be administered by their parents. The minors wouldn't have administrative control over their devices at all. > You want to use your friends Wi-Fi? Now that requires full identification so that we know that its not some kid The device wouldn't care how the connection to the internet is made. It ultimately obeys the parents' settings. The Wi-Fi doesn't need to care either way. > You are just moving the verification point to another gate, it means that no anonymous connections are possible anymore to the entire Internet because we want to allow parents to control their kids. Not at all. This wouldn't affect people without parental controls on their device at all. They'd be able to have anonymous connections as they do now. The only difference from the server-side is adding some special path /.well-known/parental-info.json or an HTTP header to responses that would indicate what's on the page from a parental perspective, so the device can make a decision whether to display based on its parental settings.