An interesting letter from Ofcom, about the UK's proposed social media ban for children / age verification of everyone.
The letter stops quite a way short of saying that the plan is feasible.
The most that Ofcom says is that it "*should* be technically feasible" - not "is" or "will be", but merely "should".
It then goes on to explain various technical challenges.
@neil I said very early on in the OSA debacle, Ofcom, as supposed domain experts, have an unwritten duty to refuse instructions from Parliament that are not feasible to execute.
It's slightly reassuring to see some push-back here, but I still feel like we're going to end up in a situation where Parliament demands something ridiculous, ineffective and infeasible and Ofcom mindlessly complies, side-effects be damned.
Neil Brown
Ret