kcxt4d ago

people on reddit are doing a whole lot of yapping about age verification in Linux

I would generally agree that the whole approach of these laws is total dogshit and clearly a wedge issue to enable stricter surveillance laws in the future

at the same time though, the actual implementation and potentially having a portal which exposes the users age bracket seems totally reasonable as a way to implement parental controls... I'm also not totally against holding service providers to higher standards for data processing when it comes to minors, and hey if they're doing that why shouldn't adults get the same treatment?

what im totally miffed about though is why the fuck would you get mad at systemd for adding a birthDate field to userdb, what would you have them do? Would you rather every desktop environment had its own way to store this data??

An XDG portal for this also means you can *trivially* write a stub that always identifies you as an adult or even lets you pick per-app (heck maybe per website! that might be the new cursed way of avoiding trackers under late stage capitalism)

and yeah it sure would be shit if we get real-id laws in a few years, but systemd or XDG standing on "principle" and refusing to implement this API is absolutely not going to lead to better outcomes for anyone. The last thing we want is for users in certain regions to wind up relying on implementations maintained by distros or random individuals, if we need to have this crap the least we could ask is that it's maintained by established and trusted people in the open source community!

Show threadRa (Freyja) (it/its)𒀭𒈹𒍠𒊩4d ago
@cas I would ask why providers should make it easier to implement parental controls, given what those are so often used to do (namely, horrifying shit?)
Show threadjane400 - 628.4 fan4d ago

@freya
your argument sound like an ad hominem.

one can also implement parental controls to be not creepy; without it turning into an audit of the child's every activity or doing gps tracking. reasonable parenting is working on limits in cooperation/input of the child.

new features i didn't expect and am happly suprised about this release in gnome: https://ubuntuhandbook.org/index.php/2026/01/gnome-50-will-support-bedtime-daily-screen-time-parental-controls/amp/

@cas

Show threadkcxt4d ago

@jane @freya agreed, this was basically the point i was trying to get to. parental controls in Linux are absolutely a good feature to have, and the GNOME community have earnt a lot of respect from me for implementing this functionality. The ability to impose restrictions on non-sudo users (particularly children) is NOT a restriction of freedoms, I'd argue it's the opposite.

Knowing you can give your kids a device running a FOSS OS while being able to ensure they aren't accessing software they shouldn't is a good thing, give them the freedom to enjoy tech without looking over their shoulder

Show threadwitch_t *navi4d ago
@cas @jane @freya

I mentioned here here:
https://social.vlhl.dev/notice/B4PU0aMRZdCXV8QAJk

but tl:dr I believe that a child young enough to need parental controls should not be left alone unsupervised w/ an internet device, and that teenagers should have already learnt discretion and have built a trust relationship with their parents

in a good world then, parental controls would just be guardrails for the former, but in the world we live in, i fear how much abuse, well, abusive parents might cause on the latter by forcing parental controls on their devices
witch_t *navi (@[email protected])

on "growing up tech literate, and parental controls" i was allowed to use the computer we had at the house at around 6yo my dad would install games for me, mom would watch videos with me but cru...

Show threadjane400 - 628.4 fan

@navi @freya @cas

a trust relationship is exactly the thing i am arguing for, i'm not sure how much you dealt with actual parenting and supervising children.

you're arguing against a cptsd survior, i had very a abusive parents. the reality is that we as a foss community should enable healthy foss tools, because the stalkerware will get developed anyway due to money incentives. and it will not rely on any age bracket stuff as the primary usecase for stalkerware is stalking partners.

Mar 20 at 7:09amWeb
Show threadwitch_t *navi4d ago
@jane @freya @cas

i speak out of the self experience i mentioned above, out of the need growing up of watching over my small brother, and out of the personal experience shared with me by friends while growing, who did have the parental controls in apple devices used against them, and that's all
Show threadjane400 - 628.4 fan4d ago
@navi so your arguing against a specific implementation? memories while growing up are heavily skewed, that was a really though thing to learn for me while taking care of a kid for a year. there were even moments were it made sense to lie or heavily skew the truth, a thing i couldn't have imagined before.
Show threadwitch_t *navi4d ago
@jane i argue against specific features, that are often included in "parental control"

so far the only thing people convinced me could be okay, is screen timeout timers

what i get worried is, for a teenager, making it easy to allowlist-only or blocklist websites and content types, and making it easy to track everything they do with their devices

sure, there is other ways of doings those things, but the easier those tools are to enable and use, the more i saw them get abused
Show threadF4GRX Sébastien4d ago
@navi @jane kids are smart. the more you censor, the more the teenager will use their friend's unlocked devices, and then you will see NOTHING.
Show threadjane400 - 628.4 fan4d ago

@navi you should be arguing against technology being sold as a substitution for teaching and parenting. of course big tech with its "ask me later" doesn't teach consent.

this is isn't a technological problem, this is a societal problem and tolerating abusive parents. not asking children in school what they face at home, how they are allowed to use technology. only since the year 2000 have children the right for nonviolent parenting in germany.