Last I checked if you're over 60 then you're an Adult and can do adult things. You have long since stopped growing into your body by then. Children are not finished yet, and continue to have their brains mature and grow into the early 20s
If at “over 60 you can do adult things”, why do we take their drivers licenses away from and make them sit a drivers test every year unlike adults under 60?
No more fascists - if you'd said it 15 years ago when it was old people voting for fascists. But in this last election it was the young people and the immigrants who voted for fascism, which makes no sense to anyone - sheep voting for the wolf who proudly promises to eat them. You can't make heads not tails.
Then why do the people he hand-picked say it is? Should I ignore the words coming out of their mouths and pens? Should I ignore the words coming out of Trump's own mouth? Then what should I use to determine whether it's fascism or not?
I've always been a supporter of those, my view on democracy is not to be mature enough, but to be a part of society with needs and ideas, school students neee to be represented because they're part of a society
I wonder how can you implement such a law without forcing people to identify online ? Will they enforce a digital ID that you need to use to access the web or social media ?
No comment on the implementation, but I wonder if there's some value in just allowing parents to be able to point to this and say "No, little Fred, you're not allowed to have an Instagram account until you're 16. It's the actual rule."
The government currently tendering for providers of different systems. See here [1] and here [2]:
Tender documents released on Monday show the technical trial is slated to begin “on or around 28 October”, with the provider also expected to assess the “effectiveness, maturity, and readiness” of technologies in Australia.
Biometric age estimation, email verification processes, account confirmation processes, device or operating-level interventions are among the technologies that will be assessed for social media (13-16 years age band).
In the context of age-restricted online content (18 years or over), the Communication department has asked that double-blind tokenised attribution exchange models, as per the age verification roadmap, and hard identifiers such as credit cards be considered.
You don't necessarily need to actually attempt to globally enforce it. It's like speeding, right? Everybody knows the law, and a lot of people choose to break it. We can't check everybody's speed all the time, so instead we selectively enforce.
The real change though comes from parent's perceptions. Right now there's age limits of 14-years-old on most social media platforms, however most parents just see this as a ToS thing, and nobody cares about actually violating it. Once it becomes law, the parents are suddenly responsible (and liable) for ensuring their children are not breaking the law by accessing social media. It's not going to stop everybody, but it'll certainly move the needle on a lot of people who are currently apathetic to the ToS of social media platforms.
That's exactly what they're aspiring to here, following on from a well-established pedigree of Australian lawmakers and their dysfunctional relationship with the Internet.
A drop down list of birth dates/years "works" for most age restricted sites - I guess the logic is that if a user is lying about their age, it's not the sites problem.
Article states that sites must demonstrate they are taking reasonable measures to enforce this though - a lot will come down as to how courts interpret that. If they go to the extremes of the KYC laws in australia I imagine a significant fraction of adults will not want to verify their age.
The government is being deliberately non-prescriptive about that, as they are about what qualifies as 'social media' (statement of fact - no comment on the approach itself). Ideally the legislation is accompanied by a government digital service that allows 3rd parties to verify age _without_ divulging full identity, but I don't see that side of things being discussed anywhere down here :(
Hell of a time to run a VPN or a blackmail service... Porn site profiles with activity history + real traceable identities will make the Ashley Madison leak look quaint.
They're probably referring to the scope. Very few people were directly impacted by Ashley Madison (though there was at least one reported suicide due to the leaks), but lots of people watch porn and most of those people would not be too keen on their browsing history being leaked even if it's relatively tame, and especially if it's not.
The funny thing these days is that all porn is tailored to appear as far from "tame" as imaginable.
The average PornHub user's history will be full of weird incest shit at the very least, not because of any specific interest in the genre but because so much generic heterosexual porn is labeled as such. Looks really bad for you if it makes the newspaper.
So even "tame" leakage is 100x more embarrassing than it ought to be, and thus snooping on bf/husband's devices to humiliate them over their porn usage is normalized on relationship subreddits. Same goes for them plugging your email address into the password reset form to try to verify whether you have an account on any given site.
How long are VPN services for consumers like that going to be viable? All the 5 eyes countries are trending in the same direction and they US isn't shy to press other countries to follow their regulations with the threat of being sanctioned.
What even counts as social media? Is Hackernews social media? Is my future platform where people can talk to each other social media?
It's all pure desperation, they could instead force social media companies to only promote useful educational, pro-science, pro-fitness, documentaries, family style content and then social media would be helpful. Forming communities around learning, robotics, science? What could possibly be better for children who look for purpose in life? It would be fantastic. But of course half the grifters on social media are also already hiding in those tags and serving the most shallow, useless, fake content about e.g ancient pyramid aliens or discussions about how veganism will help your body. As you can tell by my last little insertion here, half the problem is that even all the adults can't come to a shared understanding of what is "good" or true.
I think the way the EU approached this with their "digital gatekeepers" is smart. Recognize that policing the entire internet isn't possible or even desirable. Focus on those few companies with the largest capacity for harm. Different criteria might be appropriate when focusing on potential harm for children (e.g. Roblox rather than Twitter) but besides a few changes you'll probably end up with roughly the same list.
I'm not sure I'd support an outright ban, but rather very strict monitoring and requirements around moderation, in app purchasing, gambling mechanics, and so on.
In a way it shouldn't be tied to size either, it should be tied to results. If a social company is clearly only interested in profit to the exclusion of societal benefits then they deserve to be regulated.
Australia takes a different approach and says (in their Basic Online Safety Expectations 2024) that every online account must be linked to a phone number.
This is the same country that brought you "the laws of mathematics are very commendable but they don't apply in Australia".
I foresee a two- or three-tier Internet in the future, and Australia will probably be the first "western" country to block Tor.
> Australia will probably be the first "western" country to block Tor.
The Australian way would be to "ban" tor without any particular concern for enforceability or technical feasibility. Any actual blocking would be pushed onto industry somehow, which would then proceed to half-ass it, doing the absolute minimum possible to demonstrate they are complying with regulation.
I like Australia a lot, but a lot of the time it feels like political priority is to "make it look like something is being done". No one would actually care if the blocking worked or not unless the media made a big song and dance about it.
I also wonder how much of this ban is about "punishing" X and Meta in particular - Meta for it's refusal to pay for news and X because they didn't jump to immediately remove stuff the government wanted taken down.
> What even counts as social media?
Anything the government needs more leverage over or wants to shake down for money.
I would say anything with algorithmic personalized feed is a social media, and that's I would stop kids having access to.
I think the main danger is in the engagement maximisation done through these algorithmic feeds.
Mandate that the home/landing page of social media sites is a chronological display of people/artists/whatevers you've legitimately chosen to follow rather than maximization algorithm force feeding. For all users. The have to click to get to the algorithm zone. Problem solved.
I think the proposal is fundamentally flawed because of this reason.
Facebook, Instagram and X/Twitter are probably what's intended here, but what about Tumblr, DeviantArt or Discord? What about Reddit or a generic forum? What about VRChat or Webfishing?
If this is about protecting children from harmful depictions of body image or misogynistic content, then why not instead propose a law that states online services that allow children to join need to appropriately moderate the content that is shown to children or could face massive fines. I don't necessarily agree with that approach, but at least it would make sense with what their stated objectives are.
> What could possibly be better for children who look for purpose in life?
They sort of naturally do that if you have the appropriate challenges and opportunities around them.
> ancient pyramid aliens or discussions about how veganism will help your body.
There used to be a tabloid called "News of the Weird." This stuff just exists. You'll find it anywhere people gather. We're story tellers. When we don't have a compelling story we just make stuff up. It's identical to the point above.
> even all the adults can't come to a shared understanding of what is "good" or true.
It's not possible. If the children are intended to inherit the future then this is a flawed and reductive strategy. You will not achieve what you seek through parochial means.
Really.. I think your biggest problem should be advertising. It should be nowhere near children. Ban _that_ but keep the social media.
How about over 60? That's more likely to have a positive effect on society
Last I checked if you're over 60 then you're an Adult and can do adult things. You have long since stopped growing into your body by then. Children are not finished yet, and continue to have their brains mature and grow into the early 20s
If at “over 60 you can do adult things”, why do we take their drivers licenses away from and make them sit a drivers test every year unlike adults under 60?
and in advanced age there is cognitive decline
the median seventy-five year old’s brain is not in the same condition as the median thirty year old’s
Countries around the world need to bite the bullet and implement that for voting too.
How about we only allow those who have our same ideas? That's great for democracy, true democratic values
How's that?
No more fascists - if you'd said it 15 years ago when it was old people voting for fascists. But in this last election it was the young people and the immigrants who voted for fascism, which makes no sense to anyone - sheep voting for the wolf who proudly promises to eat them. You can't make heads not tails.
Here's a crazy thought maybe it's not actually fascism.
Which of the characteristics do you not think Trump embodies: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fascism
It seems pretty text book to me.
Then why do the people he hand-picked say it is? Should I ignore the words coming out of their mouths and pens? Should I ignore the words coming out of Trump's own mouth? Then what should I use to determine whether it's fascism or not?
I think leopards are the animal you're looking for here.
Dingoes mate
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Even better, how about <16 to >16?
I've always been a supporter of those, my view on democracy is not to be mature enough, but to be a part of society with needs and ideas, school students neee to be represented because they're part of a society
Start with 16. Increment it every year.
And make the home page an ugly green with disgusting pictures of health problems?
I wonder how can you implement such a law without forcing people to identify online ? Will they enforce a digital ID that you need to use to access the web or social media ?
No comment on the implementation, but I wonder if there's some value in just allowing parents to be able to point to this and say "No, little Fred, you're not allowed to have an Instagram account until you're 16. It's the actual rule."
The government currently tendering for providers of different systems. See here [1] and here [2]:
Tender documents released on Monday show the technical trial is slated to begin “on or around 28 October”, with the provider also expected to assess the “effectiveness, maturity, and readiness” of technologies in Australia.
Biometric age estimation, email verification processes, account confirmation processes, device or operating-level interventions are among the technologies that will be assessed for social media (13-16 years age band).
In the context of age-restricted online content (18 years or over), the Communication department has asked that double-blind tokenised attribution exchange models, as per the age verification roadmap, and hard identifiers such as credit cards be considered.
[1] https://www.innovationaus.com/govt-readies-age-verification-...
[2] https://www.biometricupdate.com/202409/australia-launches-te...
Sales of stick on mustaches will skyrocket
You don't necessarily need to actually attempt to globally enforce it. It's like speeding, right? Everybody knows the law, and a lot of people choose to break it. We can't check everybody's speed all the time, so instead we selectively enforce.
The real change though comes from parent's perceptions. Right now there's age limits of 14-years-old on most social media platforms, however most parents just see this as a ToS thing, and nobody cares about actually violating it. Once it becomes law, the parents are suddenly responsible (and liable) for ensuring their children are not breaking the law by accessing social media. It's not going to stop everybody, but it'll certainly move the needle on a lot of people who are currently apathetic to the ToS of social media platforms.
You don't!
That's exactly what they're aspiring to here, following on from a well-established pedigree of Australian lawmakers and their dysfunctional relationship with the Internet.
You do! It already happens - just not for everyone.
Example:
https://m.facebook.com/help/582999911881572
A drop down list of birth dates/years "works" for most age restricted sites - I guess the logic is that if a user is lying about their age, it's not the sites problem.
Article states that sites must demonstrate they are taking reasonable measures to enforce this though - a lot will come down as to how courts interpret that. If they go to the extremes of the KYC laws in australia I imagine a significant fraction of adults will not want to verify their age.
The government is being deliberately non-prescriptive about that, as they are about what qualifies as 'social media' (statement of fact - no comment on the approach itself). Ideally the legislation is accompanied by a government digital service that allows 3rd parties to verify age _without_ divulging full identity, but I don't see that side of things being discussed anywhere down here :(
It’s happening on porn sites in some states in the US right now. When you visit the site, they ask you to validate with your ID.
Hell of a time to run a VPN or a blackmail service... Porn site profiles with activity history + real traceable identities will make the Ashley Madison leak look quaint.
How so? Ashley Madison was a service for cheating. This would be for people watching porn - how is that worse?
The history is extremely unlikely to be available to the id validator (beyond the domain at most). VPNs can't see the actual history either.
They're probably referring to the scope. Very few people were directly impacted by Ashley Madison (though there was at least one reported suicide due to the leaks), but lots of people watch porn and most of those people would not be too keen on their browsing history being leaked even if it's relatively tame, and especially if it's not.
The funny thing these days is that all porn is tailored to appear as far from "tame" as imaginable.
The average PornHub user's history will be full of weird incest shit at the very least, not because of any specific interest in the genre but because so much generic heterosexual porn is labeled as such. Looks really bad for you if it makes the newspaper.
So even "tame" leakage is 100x more embarrassing than it ought to be, and thus snooping on bf/husband's devices to humiliate them over their porn usage is normalized on relationship subreddits. Same goes for them plugging your email address into the password reset form to try to verify whether you have an account on any given site.
How long are VPN services for consumers like that going to be viable? All the 5 eyes countries are trending in the same direction and they US isn't shy to press other countries to follow their regulations with the threat of being sanctioned.
What even counts as social media? Is Hackernews social media? Is my future platform where people can talk to each other social media? It's all pure desperation, they could instead force social media companies to only promote useful educational, pro-science, pro-fitness, documentaries, family style content and then social media would be helpful. Forming communities around learning, robotics, science? What could possibly be better for children who look for purpose in life? It would be fantastic. But of course half the grifters on social media are also already hiding in those tags and serving the most shallow, useless, fake content about e.g ancient pyramid aliens or discussions about how veganism will help your body. As you can tell by my last little insertion here, half the problem is that even all the adults can't come to a shared understanding of what is "good" or true.
> What even counts as social media?
I think the way the EU approached this with their "digital gatekeepers" is smart. Recognize that policing the entire internet isn't possible or even desirable. Focus on those few companies with the largest capacity for harm. Different criteria might be appropriate when focusing on potential harm for children (e.g. Roblox rather than Twitter) but besides a few changes you'll probably end up with roughly the same list.
I'm not sure I'd support an outright ban, but rather very strict monitoring and requirements around moderation, in app purchasing, gambling mechanics, and so on.
In a way it shouldn't be tied to size either, it should be tied to results. If a social company is clearly only interested in profit to the exclusion of societal benefits then they deserve to be regulated.
Australia takes a different approach and says (in their Basic Online Safety Expectations 2024) that every online account must be linked to a phone number.
This is the same country that brought you "the laws of mathematics are very commendable but they don't apply in Australia".
I foresee a two- or three-tier Internet in the future, and Australia will probably be the first "western" country to block Tor.
Where in that document [1] [2] does it mention every online account must be linked to a phone number.
Because it mentions that an account must be linked to an email address or phone number.
Which would be the standard for almost every online service.
[1] https://www.legislation.gov.au/F2022L00062/latest/text
[2] https://www.esafety.gov.au/sites/default/files/2024-07/Basic...
> Australia will probably be the first "western" country to block Tor.
The Australian way would be to "ban" tor without any particular concern for enforceability or technical feasibility. Any actual blocking would be pushed onto industry somehow, which would then proceed to half-ass it, doing the absolute minimum possible to demonstrate they are complying with regulation.
I like Australia a lot, but a lot of the time it feels like political priority is to "make it look like something is being done". No one would actually care if the blocking worked or not unless the media made a big song and dance about it.
I also wonder how much of this ban is about "punishing" X and Meta in particular - Meta for it's refusal to pay for news and X because they didn't jump to immediately remove stuff the government wanted taken down.
> What even counts as social media?
Anything the government needs more leverage over or wants to shake down for money.
> every online account must be linked to a phone number
They seem to be learning a lot from the Chinese.
South Koreans have needed an id to get online for more than a decade
Edit: actually never mind it was only active between the years 2007-2012
I would say anything with algorithmic personalized feed is a social media, and that's I would stop kids having access to. I think the main danger is in the engagement maximisation done through these algorithmic feeds.
Mandate that the home/landing page of social media sites is a chronological display of people/artists/whatevers you've legitimately chosen to follow rather than maximization algorithm force feeding. For all users. The have to click to get to the algorithm zone. Problem solved.
I think the proposal is fundamentally flawed because of this reason.
Facebook, Instagram and X/Twitter are probably what's intended here, but what about Tumblr, DeviantArt or Discord? What about Reddit or a generic forum? What about VRChat or Webfishing?
If this is about protecting children from harmful depictions of body image or misogynistic content, then why not instead propose a law that states online services that allow children to join need to appropriately moderate the content that is shown to children or could face massive fines. I don't necessarily agree with that approach, but at least it would make sense with what their stated objectives are.
> What could possibly be better for children who look for purpose in life?
They sort of naturally do that if you have the appropriate challenges and opportunities around them.
> ancient pyramid aliens or discussions about how veganism will help your body.
There used to be a tabloid called "News of the Weird." This stuff just exists. You'll find it anywhere people gather. We're story tellers. When we don't have a compelling story we just make stuff up. It's identical to the point above.
> even all the adults can't come to a shared understanding of what is "good" or true.
It's not possible. If the children are intended to inherit the future then this is a flawed and reductive strategy. You will not achieve what you seek through parochial means.
Really.. I think your biggest problem should be advertising. It should be nowhere near children. Ban _that_ but keep the social media.
Yes. Does Roblox count? What about Minecraft?
Start with the big 4 or 5 and add more in there as and when they become problematic. Who decides which one? Some agency.
I think the real solution is banning under 18s from having smart phones period.
Why about Sky News?
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