How does that make any sense? How is the license for a piece of software relevant to verifying age? If I make a site that is objectively harmful to minors, I can just make it open-source and I’m exempt? Or, if I make a completely innocuous site that doesn’t actually do anything but is closed source, I would have to comply?
But really, nothing should be doing strong identity verification outside of stuff like government (e.g. passports), or anything that commonly exploits identity for crime (e.g. major financial operations).
First off, we’re talking about operating systems and not websites.
Second, if it’s open source, the users can just edit out the age verification, no matter how it’s implemented. And if it’s open source, you simply can’t prevent that behavior.
In theory, the closed source systems make that more complicated, to the point where we can “rely” on those safeguards.
There’s a logic here, even if I totally disagree with the premise of the OS needing anything to do with the user’s age. Parents need to parent and we’ve had solid enough parental controls for a long time now that make this type of monitoring and control easy.
But really, nothing should be doing strong identity verification outside of stuff like government (e.g. passports), or anything that commonly exploits identity for crime (e.g. major financial operations).
FYI the article title (and the name of the law) are both misleading. The law does not require age verification, only age attestation.
Does that make the law even dumber? Probably, lol.
How does that make any sense? How is the license for a piece of software relevant to verifying age? If I make a site that is objectively harmful to minors, I can just make it open-source and I’m exempt? Or, if I make a completely innocuous site that doesn’t actually do anything but is closed source, I would have to comply?
But really, nothing should be doing strong identity verification outside of stuff like government (e.g. passports), or anything that commonly exploits identity for crime (e.g. major financial operations).
First off, we’re talking about operating systems and not websites.
Second, if it’s open source, the users can just edit out the age verification, no matter how it’s implemented. And if it’s open source, you simply can’t prevent that behavior.
In theory, the closed source systems make that more complicated, to the point where we can “rely” on those safeguards.
There’s a logic here, even if I totally disagree with the premise of the OS needing anything to do with the user’s age. Parents need to parent and we’ve had solid enough parental controls for a long time now that make this type of monitoring and control easy.
FYI the article title (and the name of the law) are both misleading. The law does not require age verification, only age attestation.
Does that make the law even dumber? Probably, lol.