The UK government's plan to teach 10 million British children how to use VPNs may be one of the most ambitious IT education projects ever launched. Experts have praised the scheme, saying that a deft combination of incentives and peer education make it more likely to succeed than other, comparable initiatives.
"With the rise of autocratic governments worldwide, VPN-literacy is more essential than ever.” said one expert, “This bold project definitely comes at the right time.”
Indeed. Suggests the left-hand doesn't know what the right-hand is doing.
> a deft combination of incentives and peer education
It's referring to the predictable response of teenagers to the social media ban, describing it in a tongue in cheek way as though it was the intended outcome
@noodlemaz @iamlayer8 @angusm no.
It's #farange treading over footprints laid down by #Putin , once again. Make UK #ruzzian movement 101.
ROFL I really must look into setting up a VPN for Chez Moose. Being a grumpy old git of a moose (old enough that even the supermarket ladies don't ask me for age verification when buying beer), all this nonsense is extremely irritating.
<Shakes walking stick at clouds.>
3:O#>
@angusm So uh, without a #VPN, your ISP can potentially view all your web traffic, right?
With a VPN, aren't we just substituting who can potentially view all your web traffic? Instead of the ISP, it's the people at the VPN that can view it?
The "just use a VPN because #privacy" crowd never seems to explain how one would choose a #trustworthy and #secure VPN.
@MuhammadFreeSoftware @akromos @DanielMReck @angusm
It is a convergence.
@DanielMReck @angusm it depends on why you are using a VPN. If all the traffic over the VPN is encrypted there is little need to trust the VPN. The crucial part for the youth is they won't appear to be in the UK.
Now whether the youth can be bothered to set up fake accounts in some country with a less authoritarian government we will see, but the evidence from Australia suggests a significant number will.
This is the best characterization of this I've read. Lovely.
The Law of Unintended Consequences
@angusm With the rise of autocratic governments
The uk is literally turning into an autocracy with weaponization of terrorist laws and having deal with evil comoanies like Palantir
"With the rise of autocratic governments worldwide, VPN-literacy is more essential than ever.” said one expert, “This bold project definitely comes at the right time.”
Starmers next project, the great british Firewall, inspired by Putins actions, all oversea cables will be cut, starlink usage banned.
What the twits are doing is to allow those who can afford starlink free internet access while restricting and dumbing down the rest of kids and youth.
Let it rain brains in westminster
The use of alternative operating systems and social media platforms, without algorithms, will also be on the sylibus.
Projects involving Linux, Graphine OS and Federated social networks are expected before the end of 2026 😉
@angusm If these sites restrict their age verification to a specific country, which is not what they want to do, then yes, VPN use will become the thing to do. Or use TOR.
Hopefully some countries will ban age verification. That will have interesting consequences.
@angusm now we need to ban vpns because THINK OF THE CHILDREN.
It's *definitely* not the responsibility of the *parents* to enforce safe internet use.
@Newhereish @angusm We are in agreement then. I think that the solution is to make social media financially liable for its content. For example, it should be easy for a woman to sue a X (for example) for an offensive deep fake. The penalties should be in the hundreds of thousands of $ per page view.
Damage to children caused by social media should be the same. Currently suing a social media company in the US, UK and EU is mostly about proving that the social media company should be held liable for its content. That needs to change.
@Newhereish @angusm Agreed but we should keep in mind that social media companies make money from controversy so they are not at all likely to police bad behavior unless they are published.
For example, during the Sean Combs trial an incredible amount of AI slop depicting celebrities having sex Diddy garnered YouTube millions of page view. Clearly YouTube should police this sort of thing, but hey, millions of page views.
I think the problem with the "public space" philosophy, which is well meaning, is ignores the fact that social media companies are not public and do not act in the public's interest. They act in their stock holder's financial interests.
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