I’m asking for public policy ideas here. A lot of countries are enacting age verification now. But of course this is a privacy nightmare and is ripe for abuse. At the same time though, I also understand why people are concerned with how kids are using social media. These products are designed to be addictive and are known to cause body image issues and so forth. So what’s the middle ground? How can we protect kids from the harms of social media in a way that respects everyone’s privacy?
Stop. Giving. Them. Phones.
Stop whining. No they don’t need one. NO THEY DON’T.
No.
No they’re not special.
No they’re not too busy. Neither are you.
No iPad either.
Stop. Shut up. No. Phones.
I agree, if you limit “phones” to “smart phones and portable computers”. There are reasons to give a kid a small, no internet dumbphone. But yes, don’t give kids unrestricted access to the family PC, and DEFINITELY dont give them their own.
That’s the tack I’m taking. My eldest goes to high school next year and most of his peers are automatically getting a smartphone at that point. He’ll be 13. He can forget it. A dumb phone at a push, for safety. That’s it.
A dumb phone at a push, for safety.
I think that’s a good compromise.
The German passport allows services to verify age through you NFC reading your passport on your phone and confirmation of validity through intermediates state service. All they see is a confirmation of age requirement met. No name, no age, no address, no face.
Some other countries have similar systems. It’s already a EU directive to be implemented on a broader European level.
How would that work online? How would they confirm it’s your passport, and that it’s a real passport that was really scanned (instead of a browser plugin)?
This sounds like a much better strategy than the Australian model of simply scanning your face and using AI to guess your age
Burn it with fire?
Honestly there needs to be an honor system in place for the internet.
I think access needs to be granted through some branching moderation. Like one person vouches for two and they can then vouch for two each. If ever one person is found doing wrong, that whole branch gets skewered at the person who vouched for them.
Sure its not perfect but it’s a system that doesn’t immediately jeopardize your anonymity.
Lmao, now you’ve created a perfect relationship map for advertising/tracking who knows who.
Thats a unique idea
Stop using it entirely.
the age verification thing was “obviously” been associated with PALINITR trying to collect private info of potential politicla dissidents. besides DISCORD they almost all enacted the same policy at once. so palinitir is trying to get access to all the potential surveillance data, it has little to do with “privacy/protecting children”
I think this is a bit more conspiracy theorist than anything else. You’re see coincidences and attributing it to a single bad actor. The reality is obviously much more nuanced. There is more and more research showing the psychological damage things like internet porn and social media have on childrens health, thanks to an entire generation being a live test subject. Social media companies have been running unregulated experiments on kids for decades now, and people are seriously noticing the negative impacts. This has resulted in law makers grasping at straws to find a solution. The less tech savvy ones are being ignorant about it and throwing privacy away for the sake of security. But age verification can be done securely with zero knowledge proofs if we spend the time to actually implement in correctly.
Palantir doesn’t need our ID’s to track us anyway. They get way more information without it already.
The book The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt had a really clever idea. Create a regulation for operating systems that requires that their parental controls include an option that labels a device as belonging to a kid. When that option is toggled, requests will include some sort of header that labels the request as originating from a kid. Then, place onus (probably through some sort of legislation) on web platforms to restrict what content is shown to kids.
consider though - politicians nowadays don’t think. they think so little, in fact, that the last time i checked websites for self harm/sexual assault support or reporting were considered “too adult” for kids to have access to in the UK
if it was about kids’ safety, this wouldn’t have been omitted
Yeah, there’s no doubt in my mind that this tide of “think of the kids” is just a fascist dogwhistle (and one with a double-entendre at that).
You should read the Anxious Generation. It goes into a lot of detail on research showing the damage social media has had on an entire generation. It’s pretty undeniable that something needs to be done to stop/control social media’s influence on children and teens in their crucial development years. There are some people that are definitely using it as a cover for control, but there are plenty of well educated people that see a real problem and are trying to do the best they can to find a solution.
I mentioned it in my original comment! I thoroughly enjoyed it. As an older member of Gen Z, a lot of what’s written there jives with my lived experience and the intuitions I’ve developed around social media. And as a relatively young father, I’m also invested in figuring out how to give my kids the healthiest relationship with the online world possible.
I’m also a strong proponent of digital freedom and privacy. A lot of the age verification technology that’s being rolled is tied to companies like Palantir or organizations like DHS, which seem to have a rather unambiguous interest in neither the freedom nor the privacy (nor really the general wellbeing) of the populace.
I’m of the opinion that any system that could enable or facilitate mass surveillance is not an acceptable solution to the problem of protecting kids online.
The idea I laid out in my original comment was inspired by the idea Jonathan Haidt presents in Chapter 10 (What Governments and Tech Companies Can Do Now), Section 3 (Facilitate Age Verification), 6th paragraph:
There is not, at present, any perfect method of implementing a universal age check. There is no method that could be applied to everyone who comes to a site in a way that is perfectly reliable and raises no privacy or civil liberties objections.[26] But if we drop the need for a universal solution and restrict our focus to helping parents who want the internet to have age gates that apply to their children, then a third approach becomes possible: Parents should have a way of marking their child’s phones, tablets, and laptops as devices belonging to a minor. That mark, which could be written either into the hardware or the software, would act like a sign that tells companies with age restrictions, “This person is underage; do not admit without parental consent.”
Probably don’t treat social media as a last front for free speech and let it be curated and safe for children.
Maybe its time for parents to parent their fucking kids…
I like to think I’m a tech savvy parent and the amount of tooth gnashing to setup and maintain child accounts is incredible. I’m convinced the foxes guarding the henhouse are using dark patterns to make parents give up.
Why can’t I just get a notification on my phone saying “Hey, kiddo wants to have screen time. Approve?”
Hell, I’d love a notification saying “Kiddo started watching Mr. Blah.” If I got the notification and I didn’t want them watching that, I could block the video, or creator with a click. WHY ARE WE NOT AT THIS LEVEL OF CONVENIENCE?
A LOT of these concerns would go away if phones/tablets/tv’s had these simple controls. Move those privacy controls into the home and MAKE them so easy a neanderthal could operate them.
If I have to *.newsocialbook.com into my router, you can bet your damn ass that “LiveLaughLoveMom<3” is going to keep demanding that someone else do it for her.
Capitalism. Everything you described costs money to create and maintain and it generates zero (or negative) profit. Most people aren’t going to want to pay for some sort of nanny toolkit.
Don’t get me wrong, I agree with you and it should be like that. Our current systems are not going to bring that about though.
Sounds like an opportunity to create something like that. Any devs around here up for it?
The hard way? Treat access to the Internet as if about to drive a car or being handed a gun. Along good parenting, responsibility should be taught throughout, and likewise smartphones shouldn’t be simply given to children like a Gameboy.
I cannot emphasize this enough: I do not give a single living fuck what other people’s children do on the Internet.
Good for you. Have a cookie.
Yeah bro, I love sticking my nose in other people’s business as well.
Apparently.
Doesn’t feel so good when it happens to you, huh?
Lol.
Do you have a problem with people sticking their nose in someone else’s business?
Better parent supervision is the main way to combat these issues.
Companies should also either ban minors completely or allow parents to set up child accounts linked to their account with expansive parental controls that then can be migrated to full adult account once they reach legal age.
I don’t think either will happen because there are so many stupid and lazy parents in America that don’t care what their kids do as long as it’s not bothering them
Agreed 100%. Enable parents, even not tech savvy parents, to parent. Ultimately, if the parent wants their kid to do whatever, they’ll just create an adult account for their kid. Do we really want the government parenting our kids? Sure, it may be an improvement for some, but it’s a slippery slope and could lead to a Brave New World.
Internet has replaced parenting. Kids are just another achievement after spouse and house and two cars.
Best solution IMO: Don’t let them use social media. If they really need to communicate, just buy them a SIM and or let them use your phone and SIM to contact them directly.
And if you must let them use social media, set up parental controls on your router. I suggest NextDNS for this. And basically, monitor everything your child watches or interacts and engages with. If they’re using YouTube, check their accounts to see what content they’re consuming.
Kids these days have access to the internet way too early. When I wanted to use the internet up until 14 I could either go buy my own computer (with what job lol) or I could use the family computer in the living room. Now 11 year olds are shit posting to 18+ subreddits it’s disgusting. And it’s all the parents fault. No govt regulation will fix this, you have to discipline your kids!
They should revive the “Family Computer” thing in families once again. Way better than handing them their own devices
They *will* get around it. It’s better to actually talk to them
Some of it can be accomplished by just setting universal demands for how social media works for all users:
- ban targeted advertising
- make it mandatory for companies to ensure algorithms don’t prioritize posts for making users angry, scared or depressed
Stuff like that. These kinds of regulations don’t involve ID checks, and could take care of a big chunk of the problem.
This doesn’t solve the problem at the core of social media. The inevitable comparison of fake lives on impressionable children/teens has been shown to cause depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideations. There is nothing that can be done algorithm or advertising wise that would stop that from happening.
If you do the 1st one, then most companies likely wouldn’t bother with such algorithms anymore.
The ban target advertising would definitely be a more realistic solution than banning advertisements in general (which some people are advocating for here). I really am not a fan of ads and would love if they were banned, but I understand that it’s not politically realistic due to what a large role they play in our economy.
but I understand that it’s not politically realistic due to what a large role they play in our economy.
Wut.
I should have been more clear. I mean banning advertising in general would not be realistic, so a ban on targeted advertising is a more realistic alternative
Kill the engagement algorithm. Your feed should contain a chronological list of posts made by people you subscribe to. In one stroke you could end the doomscroll - not just for kids, but for everybody. Also, infinite scrolling should be banned.
Your feed should contain a chronological list of posts made by people you subscribe to
Should that be the only way the feed should be organised by law?
in my opinion, yes. the point is to make it less addictive- and this will take away some of the ‘fun’ without isolating kids. social media is entertainment that has been branded and marketed as an essential by the people getting rich off it. i find plenty of good things on youtube without ever signing in - i just search for them. if youtube or whoever wants to use its own ad space to promote channels, i think that is probably ok - provided that the choice is not personalized by an algorithm.
How is this even remotely enforceable?
It will destroy curation. It’s an absurd concept.
I think it’s unrealistic also. I think a better solution is simply to ban endless scrolling. Require them to use pages is enforceable, and remove a proven addicting aspect to social media.
