Everyone should set it to 1970-01-01.
Age checks creep into Linux as systemd gets a DOB field
Submitted 2 weeks ago by throws_lemy@lemmy.nz to technology@lemmy.world
https://www.theregister.com/2026/03/24/foss_age_verification/
Comments
cmnybo@discuss.tchncs.de 2 weeks ago
tidderuuf@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Ive been born since 1900-01-01 for a long time now.
BillibusMaximus@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
Me too!
Although someone (steam maybe? I don’t remember) updated their system and won’t take it anymore. So now it’s 1930-01-01.
You should try it. It’s like I’m 30 years younger!
zerofk@lemmy.zip 2 weeks ago
Most people are born on the same date their whole life.
raman_klogius@ani.social 2 weeks ago
The tech nerds should be setting theirs to 1970-01-01 at 00:00 UTC.
Imgonnatrythis@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
In other news there has been a massive uptick in Boomers converting to Linux…
mrbn@lemmy.ca 2 weeks ago
Nah, I’m all about that 9001/01/01 life
LincolnsDogFido@lemmy.zip 2 weeks ago
My go to is usually 09/21/1978
mechoman444@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
This is getting blown way out of proportion.
What’s being described right now is just an optional date-of-birth field. It doesn’t block installation, it doesn’t require verification, and it doesn’t change how the OS actually works. It just exists, and you can ignore it entirely.
The leap to “this is step one toward needing a passport to install an OS” is a classic slippery slope. It jumps from a harmless, non-enforced field straight to full identity verification with no actual mechanism connecting the two.
More importantly, this ignores how Linux works at a fundamental level.
Linux is open source, which means the code is public and can be modified by anyone. If any distribution ever tried to enforce something invasive like identity checks, that code would be stripped out almost immediately and redistributed as a fork. People already fork distributions over far smaller disagreements than this, and users would migrate just as quickly.
For this scenario people are worried about to actually happen, the entire ecosystem would have to move in lockstep and the community would have to abandon one of its core principles overnight. That’s not a realistic outcome.
Being skeptical of regulation is reasonable. Treating this like the beginning of mandatory identity verification at the OS level, especially in the Linux world, just isn’t grounded in how the technology or the community actually operates.
WraithGear@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
with mass adoption of enshitification. and with the world in general. calling things a slippery slope fallacy is a long and losing gamble.
if the field was put in because of a law, then it’s for a reason, if the data isn’t important, or enforced, then it is useless and should not have been added.
mechoman444@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Commentary like this is exactly what grinds my gears.
This isn’t analysis, it’s implication, conjecture, and conspiracy framed as insight.
The age verification laws are objectively bad. They do nothing meaningful to protect children, degrade the quality of the internet, and hand more authority to a government that already has too much.
But your line of argument is also flawed. I’ve already stated my position clearly. Repeating “it’s probably worse” adds nothing of substance.
More importantly, the fundamental architecture of Linux makes this entire premise irrelevant. It is open source and inherently resistant to centralized control. Governments can pass whatever laws they want; they cannot meaningfully enforce them at the system level in an ecosystem designed to be forked, modified, and redistributed at will.
Lucidlethargy@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
I wonder if it was put in for the same reason CA passed a self-reporting law recently. I wonder if it’s an attempt to repel through malicious compliance far worse age verification that’s forced at a federal (US) level.
lightnsfw@reddthat.com 2 weeks ago
It’s giving an inch. We shouldn’t be doing that. We should be fighting tooth an nail against every single aggression against our privacy. They’ve already taken far too much.
Bjornir@programming.dev 2 weeks ago
What is the use case for that field? I do not see it as being used as anything else than a stepping stone towards age verification.
nutsack@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
this is the correct way to frame this issue. it serves no purpose other than to support things that are further down a slope
bruzzard@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
If that is the case, explain why is it being implemented in the heat of mass age verification? What is the motive?
mechoman444@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
The motive is mass government surveillance obviously.
But like with many things in our government federally and statewide, these people don’t actually understand how the technology functions. They can make all the laws that they want and Linux will still remain an open source software.
cley_faye@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
is a classic slippery slope
Were have you been the last few years or so? We’re not just “going down” one slippery slope after another, we’re speeding down them.
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Classic Authoritarian Log Flume
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
What’s being described right now is just an optional date-of-birth field.
The timing is dogshit.
merde@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
The contents of the field will be protected from modification except by users with root privileges.
sudo my age to a thousand years then; no, thank you very very much
sudoer777@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
*run0 since its systemd
RoddyStiggs@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 weeks ago
My date of birth is FU/CK/YOU
Prox@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
YOU-FU-CK is the better format and this is not debatable.
RoddyStiggs@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 weeks ago
This guy fucks
Poteau_Poutre@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
I prefer the ISO format
Imgonnatrythis@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
FU/CK/YOOU
NarrativeBear@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
No thanks, not the distro I will be using.
rockSlayer@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 weeks ago
Systemd isn’t a distro, it’s an init and bootstrapper that underlies several distros
texture@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
they easily might have meant that the distro they will be using has declared they will not implement this
RIotingPacifist@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
If the hyperventilators could read that would be a very good point.
Treczoks@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
It is just a field. What it contains, if anything at all, is irrelevant.
xcel@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Every step towards making people feel at ease giving personal information away, makes the next one easier.
GreenBeanMachine@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
This is step 1.
Final step: Scan your passport to verify and populate the date of birth field.
SomethingBurger@jlai.lu 2 weeks ago
I remember when this happened for the real name, email and phone number fields.
ramble81@lemmy.zip 2 weeks ago
My hate of SystemD is further justified! And you all just called me gray haired and not willing to update with the times!
eleitl@lemmy.zip 2 weeks ago
Remember when they said “relax, it’s just an init system, no biggie”? Pepperidge farm remembers.
cyberpunk007@lemmy.ca 2 weeks ago
1930-01-01, done. But this shouldn’t be a requirement to begin with either.
mech@feddit.org 2 weeks ago
I’m a Debian guy so I’ll set mine to April 28, 1973.
BradleyUffner@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
[deleted]0x0@infosec.pub 2 weeks ago
Ex microslop employee and self appointed systemd emperor Lennart poettering decided to roll that back and proceed, he also banned all discussion about the issue on the projects github
underisk@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
An init system does not need to know my personal details; it’s for starting programs in a specific order just fuck off with this shit. You don’t even have to capitulate to this stuff and these freaks are out here doing it preemptively like they expect a fucking pat on the head for being first in line to dive tongue first on to that boot.
AcornTickler@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
Systemd isn’t an init system. Systemd-init is an init system and it is a part of the systemd suite.
underisk@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
Whatever the fuck it is it doesn’t need to know how old I am to do its job.
eleitl@lemmy.zip 2 weeks ago
It has been sold as just an init system to people who argued it’s a Katamari Damacy. We now know who was right.
paraphrand@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
What service should handle it instead?
RibbidRabbid@sopuli.xyz 2 weeks ago
Why is it need at all??
NONE