Online Safety Act

I've not provided my ID to any websites and still have full access - except where I am already paying for content (Spotify, etc.). I did have to pose for a selfie on Reddit, but that took about 10 seconds.

 

Yep i have used a retired/spam email address to verify my age without sending any useable data to anyone

 

These "foreign" companies are bound by the same GDPR laws that the VPN providers (notorious for selling personal data btw - always read Ts&Cs especially if its a free VPN) and the social media sites you are signed up to (even worse than VPN providers for selling and feeding data to marketing companies) are. It's a bit weird saying you trust companies like FB, twitter and reddit who regularly provide user data to marketing groups and service providers but dont trust an ID verification company bound by the same laws.

Education doesn't work unless everyone actions it and that will never happen in a million years..all the kids with no parental controls will expose their peers to the inappropriate content rendering it all pointless. The real issue is that the internet is completely unfiltered and uncensored and regulation is 30+ years overdue. **** that its been politicised for sure.. but.. welcome to the 21st century.

 

I don't have an issue with this, but as usual government can't do anything properly, or maybe doesn't want to. Verification to use Discord, Xbox chat, Google, Spotify, Wikipedia and others all now being reported as requiring facial identification, and no I'm not sending my photo to a company in Singapore if I get asked to do this.

If you're going to use a VPN get a decent one and pay for it or use Duckduckgo for free. I've used Proton for years and it's excellent and is continually rated as such. Free ones and those mass advertised via social media are in the round not to be trusted.

 

Surely you can see why Xbox chat should be verified though @Watcher_Of_The_Skies ?

 

How surprising that searches for Tor Browser (a way to access the dark web full of illegal porn and other things) have skyrocketed since this legislation came in. Who could ever have seen this coming.

I’m sure kids are loads safer on there though.

 

Trying to ban VPNs now, worse then China.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cn438z3ejxyo

Nothing to do with VPNs allowing you to see political threads that are being screened out now in the UK?

 

How do you know it’s kids who searched for it and not adults? Is that searches on that browser or searches of those two words on other browsers?

 

If you read the article, it literally calls for age verification on VPNs not a ban.

Banning VPNs would kill a huge area of remote working including external IT support companies. Its not even on the table. A couple of ignorant people have called for a ban because they dont understand what VPNs actually are but it ain't happening. Ever.

 

Trying to ban vpn’s would be like trying to fill a colander with water…. People would just use the less legitimate ones….

 

Thats not really the issue though. The issue is they are something that has a legitimate function that people have since started using them for personal use. You cant ban them entirely but it would be very sensible to regulate them properly. I find it odd that anyone would argue against that.

Just another example of how society let the internet become the wild west rather than putting in sensible protections as new services came along.

 

It is absolutely insane how unregulated the internet is. Children can just look at anything, and talk to anyone, anywhere. Yes, this act is incredibly clumsy and there’s a million holes in it but it’s the first real attempt and it was never, ever going to be anything like perfect. Something is a good 30 years overdue though and it absolutely has to happen. I always like to look at things the opposite way, and imagine the new thing had always been the rule and the plan was to take it away. Imagine the outrage if the news article was ‘all adult content is no longer going to require ID, we’re just going to trust kids to not click ‘I’m over 18’.

 

Searches for that “topic” on google.

Obviously it’s not all kids but it’s a net negative for society that the government are pushing kids OR adults towards the dark web.

 

As I've said before. The kids you are talking about are older. Its no different to trying to stop 15 year olds smoking weed and drinking maddog 20/20 in the park on a Friday night. They will always find a way.. but that doesn't mean we should legalise weed and get rid of age restrictions on alcohol.

I can't imagine many of those hitting the dark web are 5-13 year olds, right? Even if it doesn't stop all kids accessing porn, it does stop algorithms feeding them self harm and pro suicide content.

 

Even if it’s giving adults a reason to veer into the dark web it’s a problem.

For the record i very much think weed should be legalised.

And kids are legally allowed to drink alcohol at 5 years old.

I just don’t think there’s any realistic way to control the internet in the way they’re trying to and any attempts will just make the problem far worse even if you don’t consider the political censorship a problem.

The only thing that can be done is giving resources and support to parents to teach them how to lock down kids devices and fund additional tools to help with that, along with extra mental health support funding.

That’s too much like hard work though isn’t it for parents and the government. Better to just censor information and push the problems down the line when we’ve got a population growing up without access to as much knowledge as other countries.

 

It’s all got a whiff of the moral panic though imho. Satanic abuse in the 90s, music causing suicide in the 80s and the PMRC, Mary Whitehouse, etc.

good article here about the psychology of it all.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/...tory-of-moral-panics-about-kids-and-media/amp

 

(__)_)::::::::::: D


If you saw the above and haven't given up your ID then you'll be reported to Starmer and his secret police

 

I think you looking at google trends does not show the actual numbers or uptake rate of such actions and is in no way a measure that can be used to judge this

Surely you are not arguing for weed to be completely deregulated so there are no laws protecting people whatsoever though? or suggesting 5 year olds might as well be allowed to buy booze at an off license? The regulations are there to protect people. The internet having no age related regulation other than an honour system is absolute madness. This law doesn't fix everything and is far from perfect but it absolutely protects many of the most vulnerable from harmful content. Its a start and aspects of it really do work.

Unfortunately, if given a choice between some level of political censorship and children having free and easy access to utterly inappropriate content then any reasonable parent will make that sacrifice. Sorry to break that to you.

You cannot realistically be arguing that education is an appropriate replacement for this act? The truth is we need BOTH. Do you really believe that all parents would abide by such teachings? Do you not see that those that dont then have kids who have the ability to expose othe kids to inappropriate content as well as themselves? If parents don't regulate their own kids do we throw them in prison? Take their kids off them??

No one is arguing for total censorship and this is not what this act does. It simply incorporates age verification and forces sensible moderation on providers. The fact that some adults would rather use the dark web or unsafe VPNs than provide basic data to 3rd party companies regulated by the same laws as companies like Google and Facebook, who they will happily give their data to, is a them problem not a government problem.

 

What an absolute load of crap that is.

‘moral panic derives from the implicit or explicit assumption that adults have a moral duty to protect the young’ - are people really arguing that adults don’t have a moral duty to protect young children?

‘A common assumption underlying such panics is that children are innocent, vulnerable, and lacking in self-control.’ - have they ever met a 9 year old?

‘We also make assumptions about what is good for kids or not, without respecting or even asking for their opinions. We hate the thought that kids like better what they choose themselves than what we try to foist on them’ - I’m not going to ask their opinion on hardcore p0rn, no, and them ‘liking it’ is a concern, not a reason to let them watch it.

Playing a game is one thing, watching bdsm, real videos of people dying, ChatGPT encouraging suicide, being groomed by older people, are a bit different.

 

100%

Regulation is so far overdue.

I also cant help but be a little suspicious of what the most vocal critics are getting up to online that they are so desperate for it to remain completely unregulated