This is all dumb. If you’re worried about kids surfing porn sites then the legal guardian should act accordingly. There are so many methods to blocking porn sites that it’s almost hilarious. Web filtering; most ISPs are able to support website filtering on their supplied gateway or DNS. Parental controls on device; most devices come with opyional locks built-in at this point especially if it’s aimed towards children.
Sure, it’s not perfect but it’s better than removing yet another layer of web anonymity. We see how well browser fingerprinting is going, let’s not make it easier to track who is browsing where than it already is. But that’s the real point behind these bills, isn’t it?
cubism_pitta@lemmy.world 1 month ago
I have to agree with PornHub’s concept.
A device should be able it indicate in hits header whether its primary user is an adult or a minor and the service can react accordingly.
It won’t protect all the children but children of parents who can’t be assed to setup a device properly will have problems no matter how much we increase the surveillance state.
RandomPrivacyGuy@lemm.ee 1 month ago
I can already see that being used for targeting children with specific ads on the internet.
cubism_pitta@lemmy.world 1 month ago
The laws around advertising are fucked to begin with but the should actually be used in advertising 100%
The minor flag would actually remove the LARGE gray area that platforms take advantage of to push harmful ADs and content to kids (Today they just get to play dumb)
This would actually create a framework to enforce existing advertising laws as well as data collection laws with regards to minors.
Examples: Minors should not see ads for holsters, knives, ammo, ED medications, Diet drugs, muscle building drugs, Alcohol, Tobacco products, Online Gambling
These are all things I have seen advertised on YouTube to me; Granted I am not a minor but I am also just using Youtube by going to the site with no account.
Bzdalderon@lemmy.ca 1 month ago
Kids are babied already but if 14 year olds can vote in party elections, and 16 year olds can consent to sexual intercourse with adults, then I don’t think restricting porn is our problem. Either kids can make decisions, or all of these laws need to align with each other more logically.
We have taken parents rights away to allow children to make decisions on their gender and name changes, yet we expect parent to be responsible for their actions like accessing porn.
I could not care less about whatever the final say is on age restrictions, but if there are gonna be rules, at least make them make sense you know? I also do not love that I have to verify my identity to use the internet. Look at the UK and how that’s working out there even without IDs. Talk about authoritarian control.
This stuff is the whole reason I switched to this platform.
cubism_pitta@lemmy.world 1 month ago
I am actually in full agreement.
A header would put the setting on the device and only indicate “Minor” or “Not Minor” which would allow to restrict or allow porn without having to collect everyone’s PII just so they can crank their hog.
If you read previous things though such an indicator would put a lot more responsibility onto Social Media platforms to not show harmful content with minors. Today they get away with it because “TOS says only 18 year olds are allowed to us this service”
South Park kind of nailed the attitude en.wikipedia.org/…/South_Park_(Not_Suitable_for_C…
LeninsOvaries@lemmy.cafe 1 month ago
That’s not a contradiction. Gender and name are about who the child is. Porn is about who the child wants to imagine having sex with. One of them, 99% of children are perfectly capable of making a good decision on. One of them can potentially be traumatising, and certainly isn’t absolutely necessary for a good life and healthy development.
That said, it’s not the government’s job to control it. An “I am 18” button and a lesson in health class are enough.
If porn sites must be legislated, here’s a better way: force them to display information to users on unrealistic depictions, the dangers of underage sex, and counselling resources.
slacktoid@lemmy.ml 1 month ago
What’s gonna stop a pedo from changing the headers to child so that they can access the child internet where all the children are? Like it’s not a great solution to me.
Quill7513@slrpnk.net 1 month ago
your understanding of what the proposed header solution is is way off base. “protecting the kids” isn’t about keeping adults from interacting with kids in online forums, it’s about keeping the kids from accidentally seeing porn (really it’s about making the lives of sex workers more dangerous). think of it like a tv v-chip but for the internet, not as a nightclub bouncer creating two different online communities and making sure they don’t interact with eachother
dojan@lemmy.world 1 month ago
The same thing that’s stopping pedophiles today of course.
emr@lemmy.sdf.org 1 month ago
The idea isn’t to let sites restrict adults, just let them restrict kids. So there wouldn’t be a child internet.
ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca 1 month ago
So what if it was no different than now?
Nothing stopping adults from playing Roblox now, but we know why they are there
humanspiral@lemmy.ca 1 month ago
Lucky for the pedo, you never have to prove you are under 18, if that is what you tell the website.
gian@lemmy.grys.it 1 month ago
I think he means that the headers come from the device making the call, not the one receing it, so a pedo should be able to change the headers of my device which is not that easy.
Then yes, the receing end could simply ignore the header anyway, it would be way easier.
Iheartcheese@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Don’t worry dude at least one person sees this is a joke
General_Effort@lemmy.world 1 month ago
These ideas are all fundamentally misguided. Let’s take a step back what we are trying to do here: We want to create a system so that the government can withhold certain information from certain people. That’s both difficult and dangerous.
PornHub’s idea requires cooperation from the hosters. You are not likely to get global agreement on that. So you will still need to do something about those foreign sites, such as blocking them.
At that point, such a law would achieve 2 things:
Blocklists that parents can install on their devices already exist, so there would be no change in that regard.
Of course, minors have no trouble circumventing such software. They have plenty of time and they are horny. You can’t win. The only faint hope might be to include such features at deeper levels, similar to existing DRM schemes. This would be ripe for abuse by bad actors or governments. It certainly would be used against the consumer by the copyright industry and tech monopolies; just like existing DRM schemes.
So we really should ask why we would want to walk further down this expensive, hostile, and dangerous path. Are we afraid that masturbation causes blindness?
cubism_pitta@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Government in this case is forcing sites to collect PII to verify age not blocking content not blocking content themselves.
I am working under the knowledge that these age verifications are not theoretical (Its the end game of all the KYC startups from last decade)
If you are in the south in much of the US these ID checks are already forced and will only expand
A browser header gives the result without building a Database of people who like porn
Browser headers also put the responsibility on sites that promote dangerous things to kids (its in your best interest as a site that can deliver porn, things not suitable for kids to check and respect the header from a liability perspective)