miaMar 4
i want to clarify something w.r.t. california requiring age "verification" at an operating system level. the way the law is specified is actually exactly the correct way to do this - users self-report their age during setup and that information is available to applications that have a reason to request it. it is entirely within the spirit of the law to add whatever age the user reports to a database that can be read from, like /etc/passwd which already can store things like emails or phone numbers. there is no suggestion that an ID check or facial scan be part of account setup, and any vendor implementing this would be doing so of their own accord

the vision of an age verification scheme like california's is that an adult can set up a child's account to be in a specific age group, then have the system automatically inhibit the child's access to applications that they aren't allowed to access. this could be further built upon by laws requiring ex. gambling services to check this signal before allowing the user to sign up. of course this can be circumvented, but all laws can

the way this will effect linux is not going to be described well by media because they don't tend to have the best understanding of the open source ecosystem. it will be up to distributions (not linux itself) to ensure there is an age step in account setup and a library for accessing that information. this is fairly simple to implement and work has already started on it

additionally, i am not interested in debating anyone on whether age verification should exist. im trying to clear up misinformation about a very simple bill that anyone can read. if i don't know you, i have no reason to discuss philosophy with you
Show threadmia
coverage on this bill (and the one in colorado) continues to be misleading. neither bill prohibits children from creating accounts. neither bill prohibits children from installing an operating system. the closest to what system76 reports as saying "anyone under 18 isn’t supposed to create a computer account on their own" is the definition of an account holder being someone over 18, but this is not at all an enforced part of the law. again, no part of the law says you have to be an adult to create an account, the law is just focused on the case of parents creating accounts for their children

new york's proposed bill, on the other hand, explicitly disallows self-reporting age, and will thus lead to id uploads and/or face scans on practically every computing device. this is the exact thing that people were fearmongering california's bill to be about, yet nobody seems to be talking about it. if you want a big scary privacy invasion bill to yell about, yell about the new york one which actually does the things you're scared about, not the california one that mandates one field during account setup
Mar 6 at 10:16pmWeb
Show threadmiaMar 10
despite my disagreements with system76's framing of this issue, i do very much appreciate their efforts to exclude open source software from these requirements: fosstodon.org/@carlrichell/116201429639953387 . while the california and oregon bill have been overblown, excluding open source projects would make a lot of sense, and their work is genuinely useful. im glad the money ive spent on system76 hardware is going to lobbying for open source carve-outs
Carl Richell (@[email protected])

Today, I met with Colorado Senator Matt Ball, co-author of Colorado OS Age Attestation Bill SB26-051. Sen. Ball suggested excluding open source software from the bill. This appears to be a real possibility. Amendments are expected for the CA age attestation bill. It's my hope we can move fast enough to influence excluding open source in the CA bill amendments. No illusions, it's an uphill battle, but we have an open door to advocate for the open source community.

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