Sarah Jamie LewisMar 5

RE: https://mastodon.social/@sarahjamielewis/116161459299855467

Something I want to make clear:

The "age verification" bit of the CA/CO laws are not the bit I care about i.e. a law that requires an operating systems to implement some kind of parental control feature is...whatever.

The bits I care about are the obligations on developers to call APIs and then that invocation being taken as evidence of knowledge.

Specifically, I think a -legal- requirement to:

- make any kind of call is an attack on speech
- know a users age (bracket) is a privacy violation

Show threadSarah Jamie LewisMar 5

The way I expect this to go down is that Android/iOS/etc. will roll out an age bracket API call in the near future and tie that API call to some set of foundational permissions (e.g. internet access / file access / etc) - they have done this in the past, notably for API deprecation.

A minimally invasive implementation of this will likely only restrict apps running if the OS itself is being run in a kids-mode .

(But that isn't what the laws actually require)

Show threadSarah Jamie LewisMar 5

It's a very, very short jump from "the law requires you to call this API to know a users age" to "the law requires you to call this API to backdoor the rng"

The precedent of the former makes me very uneasy.

I cannot in good conscious support software on any platform subject to a jurisdiction that mandates such calls.

(I also think making the existence of parental controls settings on an OS as mandatory is also a little iffy, but in a less catastrophic way)

Show threadgibwarMar 5
@sarahjamielewis the way you worded this made me think of that isn't source code considered a form of protected speech? In other words, can laws that force you to call certain API endpoints be a form of compelled speech by the government? I'm guessing I'm way off but it feels like it should follow along those lines.
Show threadSarah Jamie LewisMar 5

@gibwar

source code is at least expression in most jurisdictions (and certainly the act of writing it would fall under speech - so it can't be compelled)

Where things are murky is in the packaging and distribution of software, especially binary formats, since there are other laws that govern e.g. malware/spam/circumvention/reveng/dual purpose tech which start to eat away at the fringes.

And any commercial adjacent activity (payment/support/donations/conferences) etc. also complicate matters.

Show threadSarah Jamie Lewis

@gibwar

Basically, you cannot be compelled to build software in a free society.

But the government can certainly say "if you want to make a living from software, you are required to do X/Y/Z and not do A/B/C" like they do with many other areas.

Where software is somewhat unique is the large amount of volunteer/open projects sit on the blurred line in between personal and commercial. Laws like this very much endanger that unique culture.

Mar 5 at 11:59pmWeb