Aral Balkan15h ago

RE: https://toot.cafe/@soapdog/116290204253136215

“So it failed age verification and locked me out of many features. Bear in mind, I am 45 years old. I have an Apple account for 25 years, the age of my personal account alone should already verify my age.

Credit cards are not documents. Many people don’t have them. Apple don’t provide any other way to verify your age because they are a stupid American company with American values in which you’re just as human as your credit score.

Age verification is a scam, but checking it with a credit card is even worse.”

hupf2h ago
Show threadGrapheneOS
@aral The laws being proposed and passed requiring providing age brackets to apps and websites are a horrific invasion of privacy for minors putting their safety at risk. It not only enables targeting minors in harmful ways particularly for the lowest age brackets but also leaks their birth date to apps and websites on the day they move into the next age bracket. One of the biggest lobbyists for these OS level age verification laws is Meta which just lost a court case for exploiting minors.
8:08pmWeb
Show threadGrapheneOS11h ago
@aral These laws dictating the information can only be used for gating access based on age is beyond ridiculous. There's no doubt they're aware it's going to be heavily used beyond the permitted use. It cannot be excused as naivety. These same governments often treat birth dates as highly sensitive information usable as a core part of authenticating people's identity. Meanwhile, they're passing laws forcing operating systems and browsers to leak the birth dates of minors to apps and websites.
Show thread𐁂𐀑𐀐𐁐11h ago
@GrapheneOS @aral Meta is the primary driver of this among private sector companies. Their entire business model is showing ads to people, knowing exactly who they are. This is 1000% a blatant attempt to pierce pseudonymity online.
Show threadbrad7h ago

@Emerson61 @GrapheneOS @aral

Agreed that this is entirely about stripping online pseudonymity and age verification is just step one to acclimatizing people to having even more of their privacy stripped from them.

Show threadUriel Fanelli16m ago
@GrapheneOS @aral census is a specific function of the government. We can criticise govt because there is no state API to certify age. But, the fact census is a govt function, since 2500 years on, is out of discussion.