Of all the comments this post has generated, this is absolutely the most compelling argument against what I suggested. Thanks for your input.

So scenario one has a parent who is paying no attention to their child’s questions, but in scenario 2 they’re suddenly attentive and totally in tune with what their child is doing?

Look, you can’t fix everything for everyone, but a simple explanation for first time setup of a device is not difficult, especially if it was implemented as a national movement (law or otherwise). Absentee parents are still gonna absentee, but it would be a tool that parents who give a shit could really benefit from.

So just put in a different DOB. My suggestion is entirely self reported. The point is for parents to be able to setup a device and have a single point of control.

Their argument is entirely based on the assumption that the child can change their DOB on the device at any time. That’s trivially easy to avoid with a simple admin password requirement. If this was implemented in any competent way (granted, that is a lot to expect of legislators) the DOB would not be able to be changed once the device/user account is setup, or would require an administrator password which obviously shouldn’t be given to the child.

But they turn around and say this is good and how things should work:

This app lets you chat with people on the internet. If you’re a kid: ask an adult before chatting online.

Yeah, the kid that’s willing to change their device settings is definitely going to go check in with Mom before they access something they know they shouldn’t be on. That’s just an unbelievably bad argument.

What I’m describing is exactly how it’s been implemented into several Linux distros in response to the California law. Apps shouldn’t need any more verification than pinging the OS to find out the age of the user. It makes a single, easy to understand method of controlling a device intended for a child (which is the only actual benefit to any of this). It puts the responsibility on the parent or guardian setting up the device, which is exactly where it belongs.

So you didn’t bother to read my original post I guess, no wonder you’re confused.

How is that any different from what happens today? Kid makes fake account - gets adult content - Meta shrugs and says they did what they could. Of course there would be ways it can be circumvented, this would change nothing about that situation except shift the responsibility of correctly inputting the users age onto the user, which is where it should be. I’d much rather have that scenario than one where meta is forcing all users to upload government IDs; Using that excuse to harvest and store even more data than necessary.

Well that’s just nonsensical. The only obligation it removes for software developers is the need to obtain (and justification for storing) personally identifying information on its users. Websites and apps would still be responsible for moderating their content and only serving appropriate content to underage users. It wouldn’t do anything whatsoever to remove accountability for Meta.

Obviously everyone here hates this, but I’m gonna offer another perspective here and prepare for the down votes I guess.

There is a very good argument for OS level age ‘tracking’ as a means of creating a cohesive environment for software and websites to operate without having to implement individual age verification. The biggest actual issue here is how the OS determines what the user’s age is. If this is implemented similar to what California has done, the OS would simply ask for the user’s age at setup, and store that value, which can then be reported to programs and websites as needed. This would allow parents to setup a device for the child and not have to separately implement parental controls on every individual conceivable program, which are often easily circumvented. This would undermine any individual website’s attempts to use age verification as an excuse to collect government ID data, and the security risks inherent to that.

There’s no need to put any kind of validation onto this, it should simply be self-reported.

Now admittedly I don’t trust our government to implement this in any kind of reasonable way so I definitely understand and respect the outrage, but I guess I’m just trying to find some positive aspect of how this might be implemented.

I guess you don’t have children.

You absolutely do have to train them to be afraid of bears, heights, and every fucking thing you can imagine. You absolutely do have to teach them empathy and compassion. There may be some nugget of instinct, but without reinforcement it might as well not exist.