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Age verification risks tying users’ “most sensitive and immutable data” — names, faces, birthdays, home addresses — to their online activity, EFF’s Molly Buckley told CNBC. “Age verification strikes at the foundation of the free and open internet.” https://www.cnbc.com/2026/03/08/social-media-child-safety-internet-ai-surveillance.html
@eff a little sanity talk here… at some point we may need to declare the Internet a failed project and stop using it. We could build something else you know.
@eff It's not that age verification is going to happen- **it is happening**. The technical community needs to provide the safest approaches for it to happen, understanding that there ain't no perfect.
@eff
It's not about "protecting the children," it's about keeping track of you online. I cannot understand the party of "background checks for guns are an invasion of privacy" being ok with giving overall their ID to Discord or PornHub.
There are other, more effective ways with less privacy risk, of limiting access to things for minors (I'm not necessarily in favor of that to begin with, but that's a different topic) without giving your ID over to a website which will definitely be breached.
@eff
> most sensitive and immutable data” — names, faces, birthdays, home addresses — to their online activity
Not at all. This is a strawmen meticously built by #bigTech lobbyists.
The #agever is possible without giving up privacy of the users. Just there is no "political will" to make it this way. Once upon a time I tried to push such non-intruding system through RFC editor. I had been told it would be "against policy to be not political" and it will not get thru the IETF. It did not help I was a co-founder of the ISOC Chapter in my country.
Will #eff support going thru the IETF process against all that money that is now close to get the whole planet biometrics reaped/robbed? If so I might revive this RFC sketch and bring it to the current times.
@eff Most average people hear "free internet" and they do not care. To them it means free speech absolutist fringe ideals where everything, including CSAM is ok. So the framing needs to be how this harms them and their children outside the internet: high or impossible insurance preimums, difficulties accessing jobs and education, no free press, your children on a physical list with their face, ID, and address for irl predators, your entire life potentially ruined with deepfakes/identity theft
@eff As long as the public opinion is that this really is being motivated by well-meaning people who want "safety", we won't get anywhere.
Tyrants want to control people. Total monitoring means total slavery. This is a bad thing, and responsible parents should accompany children online like they would be present with a child when doing errands in the city.
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