Very shallow, naive approach to child safety. This is like banning children from riding scooters on a highway. They're just going to use a bike instead. Danger still exists.
VPNs are not the only way around this, so if you want to ban the "method of access" you need to be much more broad, and get the parents involved.
> may make provision for the provider of a relevant VPN service to apply to any person seeking to access its service in or from the UK age assurance which is highly effective at correctly determining whether or not that person is a child
"The law we made is like super duper good!!"
> Children may also turn to VPNs, which would then undermine the child safety gains of the Online Safety Act
> may make provision for the provider of a relevant VPN service to apply to any person seeking to access its service in or from the UK age assurance which is highly effective at correctly determining whether or not that person is a child
I think you're reading it wrong. Regulations may have a provision that allows providers to apply age assurance [systems ?] if the age assurance is highly effective at determining age.
I'm always surprised how ambiguous the writing is for this kind of stuff. Maybe that's the point. If the regulations don't (may is optional) have the provision, does that mean they need to demand ID?
IMO, highly effective = our buddies' tech that we declare highly effective. The whole ID push around the world is big tech trying to set up government mandated services that you're going to be forced to pay for, either directly or via taxes.
The end game is probably digital IDs with digitally signed requests for everything you do. And, of course, corrupt individuals and criminals will somehow be able to get as many digital IDs as they want.
That money should be spent on education. We're being robbed.
After enforcing age verification to prevent children from viewing those pesky Gaza genocide videos that Israel did not want them to see, they gotta ensure that those brats wont be able to get around it and still see the videos.
Its amazing how this censorship was brought on rapidly and precisely after Netanyahu demanded it at the start of last year. No surprise as half of Starmer government was funded by zionists.
UK nanny state makes it an nonviable place to live. It's pervasive from the moment you step off the plane at Heathrow and see the inane safety stickers covering every surface "WARNING: DOOR" "WARNING: WATER FROM HOT TAP IS HOT" as well as the CCTV cameras.
I'm in the UK and I've been involved in advocating for this.
I find it utterly frustrating to read the "think of the children" mockery here on HN.
I argue that this is good.
There's many reasons why children having unfettered access to the internet and different campaigners care about different aspects, so I'm going to talk about the one I care about: addiction, destroyed ability to focus, and dopamine desensitization. In the UK (and elsewhere in the world, I imagine) there's a huge problem with people addicted to phones and children are especially vulnerable. I don't care if adults are vulnerable, they have to make their own decisions. But I care that parents that do everything right in terms of educating their children on how to be healthy with respect of phones (like me and my partner) then have to send their children to schools where they're given ipads. It's not fair to say "banning doesnt work you should just not give your children phones", but then force you to send your children to schools that give them ipads and other distractions.
It's a matter of network effects (something that HN loooves talking about). In addition to the fact that phones are engineered to be addictive, you have the fact that in many schools EVERY child is on social media, and so any family that wants to stay away has to decide between isolating their child from society, or selling themselves into the "engagement industry".
I think that banning is a valid approach. It won't be 100% effective, but it doesn't matter. What matters is that it will introduce friction (another thing that HN looooves talking about) and so will reduce the total number on children that is on social media and therefore reduce the social need for other children to be in.
So, we're adding friction to break or weaken the network effects that keep these cancer companies harming children in schools.
In my opinion you're undercutting your own argument. You should be working to remove tablets from the schools instead of advocating for making us register our ID's all over the internet (which has proven to be insecure on an almost monthly basis now).
It seems you want to talk about other things rather than the VPN age-gating or the online safety act this post is about. I'll engage with the content of this post.
> but then force you to send your children to schools that give them ipads and other distractions
What does the online safety act (OSA) or this VPN age check do to prevent this? Are the "ipads" at school giving the users "unfettered access to the internet"? That seems a bit irresponsible, however I would think that your ire should instead be directed towards the schools? Perhaps I'm misunderstanding?
> In addition to the fact that phones are engineered to be addictive
Is it the phones or the content? I interpret your views as someone who should be campaigning for phones and other "distractions" to be restricted in a school environment, however the OSA and this VPN age check do not appear to tackle this.
> there's a huge problem with people addicted to phones and children are especially vulnerable
I will assume this is true for the sake of conversation. Similar to my previous query, how does the OSA or this VPN age check tackle this problem? Will banning certain types of content prevent this, or perhaps shift it? Instead of social media, would it be preferable if children were playing games on their phone? If they were then "addicted" to gaming or socialising around a popular game, would the proposal be at that point to ban children from playing games on their phone? To me, it seems the problem is less the content and more that the environment is setup in certain ways that allows this. It is unclear to me how banning and gating certain content will prevent this.
> different campaigners care about different aspects, so I'm going to talk about the one I care about: addiction, destroyed ability to focus, and dopamine desensitization
What kind of things are you pushing outside of banning material and gating access? Is there a push for educating parents of the dangers of this "addiction"? Perhaps informing people about how to use parental controls to limit the access their children have? Is there a push on companies to provide robust, and easy-to-use parental controls? I feel that parents should have the tools, yet it seems that we consider the problem out of the parents control. Why is that? If parents make an informed choice and choose differently to you, should they be allowed to do so?
> I don't care if adults are vulnerable, they have to make their own decisions.
I feel that if you are caring about children accessing "addicting" material that you should also care about your fellow citizens accessing the same. How would those adults know that this material is addictive? Are they being informed by the state? What avenues are there for them to get help? It seems that the OSA and this VPN age check do not provide any assistance to people that are perhaps already addicted, or preventing people from falling into that trap. Does the care only extend to children and no further? Should we care about building sturdy adults regardless if they are currently children or not?
My general thoughts on this is that there appears to be a lot of restriction and preventing people from accessing certain content, however very little on informing people on what those perceived dangers are. The UK government is especially keen on this restriction, yet I am seeing no push towards informing people, or providing assistance for those afflicted. To me, the proposed motivation and the implementation are incongruent with each other. The perception of safety, as opposed to an improvement in real world safety.
You're advocating for the wrong thing. Advocate to ban targeted advertising or demand that social media feeds be transparent. Don't advocate for banning VPNs from anyone who does not want to submit an ID to a company that will be breached less than a year later, or any kind of client-side measure; that's ineffective towards the goal you are trying to accomplish, and has so many other negative side effects that the whole thing is just stupid.
I admire your intentions, I genuinely mean that. I have children and worry about the horrible impact of social media too.
But your methods are flawed. I'm not even sure I can follow the logic of your post. You're talking about doing school work on iPads at school, so we must make everyone give their personal identifying information to VPNs? How does that follow?
The main problems I have with your methods:
1. You're forcing everyone in the UK to expose their personal identifying data to third party companies who *will* leak the data at some point.
2. You're forcing children to work around this and they *will* work around it and end up on websites that definitely do not have their best intentions in mind. I think your hammer approach is going to partly work, but have some extreme negative outcomes. Will you raise your hand for the harm this causes?
I'd suggest digesting what I'm saying here, really looking strongly at your aims and think if there are better alternatives.
Here is what I would like:
Whenever a UK citizen browses a social media site, I'd mandate banners that advertise the harms of social media, and also mandate that they can view the algorithm that is being used to feed them.
I plan on providing safe ways to browse the internet for my children when they're old enough. I'll give them their own VPN if needed, again with necessary precautions and education.
> It's not fair to say "banning doesnt work you should just not give your children phones", but then force you to send your children to schools that give them ipads and other distractions.
Books can also be distractions. Ask me how I know. And I notice that you're just silently shifting back and forth between "social media" (ever notice how there's no single agreed-upon definition of that in the world?) and "just anything you can do on an iPad".
> in many schools EVERY child is on social media
Yes, because the world at large uses social media for some things. And for that matter uses things other than social media, things you or your coalition want to deprive children of, for other things. What you are effectively asking is to stick everybody who's not officially an adult in a curated sandbox that will never match the richness of the rest of society. That is unfair, unreasonable, and basically a guaranteed way to fail to prepare them for actual adulthood.
Every time this comes up I always take the opportunity to suggest that it should've been a ban on _smart_phones. Not dumb phones, not laptops, not even tablets (i.e. those without sim).
Easier to enforce, you don't have to rely on the very same companies that peddle the thing you're trying to ban in the first place. It can disrupt the network effects that could hopefully be enough to let people voluntarily cut it out of their lives. People are primed to get rid of it, but can't because it is so addicting and said network effects.
It is really hard to find dumb phones to buy. Even the dumbest ones in stores right now, flip phones that look like they are 20 years old, still have some very janky Internet features baked in.
Every HN thread on social media or porn inevitably gets overrun with "but think of the children" comments calling for banning kids from social media, or the internet, or from having a phone at all.
And then every time a country actually tries to ban children from the internet, they cry "but my privacy!!!" As if having to hand your id to the state to use the internet isn't exactly what you asked for. As if the regimes most interested in "protecting the kid" aren't exactly the ones who puts you in jail for a meme too spicy.
You reap what you sow. Congrats on making the internet worse.
You either ban children from social media through age restrictions or you ban the harmful content from social media. We cant just the next generation get cooked. Both are hard to implement and unpopular and attack freedom but you must pick one because the harm is so clear.
I'm always reminded of the Snowden revelations that the GCHQ was (and still is) saving, catagorizing, and performing deep packet inspection of all internet traffic.
Nothing suprises me anymore in the UK. It's been extremely dystopian for a long time.
So parents can just sign up for children? What problem is this solving? If my government was censoring my child of course I'd sign up a Facebook/Mullvad account for them.
36 comments
[ 2.6 ms ] story [ 43.0 ms ] threadVPNs are not the only way around this, so if you want to ban the "method of access" you need to be much more broad, and get the parents involved.
"The law we made is like super duper good!!"
> Children may also turn to VPNs, which would then undermine the child safety gains of the Online Safety Act
"The law we made is easily circumvented :("
I think you're reading it wrong. Regulations may have a provision that allows providers to apply age assurance [systems ?] if the age assurance is highly effective at determining age.
I'm always surprised how ambiguous the writing is for this kind of stuff. Maybe that's the point. If the regulations don't (may is optional) have the provision, does that mean they need to demand ID?
IMO, highly effective = our buddies' tech that we declare highly effective. The whole ID push around the world is big tech trying to set up government mandated services that you're going to be forced to pay for, either directly or via taxes.
The end game is probably digital IDs with digitally signed requests for everything you do. And, of course, corrupt individuals and criminals will somehow be able to get as many digital IDs as they want.
That money should be spent on education. We're being robbed.
Its amazing how this censorship was brought on rapidly and precisely after Netanyahu demanded it at the start of last year. No surprise as half of Starmer government was funded by zionists.
something I find myself saying often lately watching BBC News every morning
How about Cloudflare Warp? And don't some browsers like Opera have builtin VPN?
What about tunnels like Hurricane Electric?
I find it utterly frustrating to read the "think of the children" mockery here on HN.
I argue that this is good.
There's many reasons why children having unfettered access to the internet and different campaigners care about different aspects, so I'm going to talk about the one I care about: addiction, destroyed ability to focus, and dopamine desensitization. In the UK (and elsewhere in the world, I imagine) there's a huge problem with people addicted to phones and children are especially vulnerable. I don't care if adults are vulnerable, they have to make their own decisions. But I care that parents that do everything right in terms of educating their children on how to be healthy with respect of phones (like me and my partner) then have to send their children to schools where they're given ipads. It's not fair to say "banning doesnt work you should just not give your children phones", but then force you to send your children to schools that give them ipads and other distractions.
It's a matter of network effects (something that HN loooves talking about). In addition to the fact that phones are engineered to be addictive, you have the fact that in many schools EVERY child is on social media, and so any family that wants to stay away has to decide between isolating their child from society, or selling themselves into the "engagement industry".
I think that banning is a valid approach. It won't be 100% effective, but it doesn't matter. What matters is that it will introduce friction (another thing that HN looooves talking about) and so will reduce the total number on children that is on social media and therefore reduce the social need for other children to be in.
So, we're adding friction to break or weaken the network effects that keep these cancer companies harming children in schools.
> but then force you to send your children to schools that give them ipads and other distractions
What does the online safety act (OSA) or this VPN age check do to prevent this? Are the "ipads" at school giving the users "unfettered access to the internet"? That seems a bit irresponsible, however I would think that your ire should instead be directed towards the schools? Perhaps I'm misunderstanding?
> In addition to the fact that phones are engineered to be addictive
Is it the phones or the content? I interpret your views as someone who should be campaigning for phones and other "distractions" to be restricted in a school environment, however the OSA and this VPN age check do not appear to tackle this.
> there's a huge problem with people addicted to phones and children are especially vulnerable
I will assume this is true for the sake of conversation. Similar to my previous query, how does the OSA or this VPN age check tackle this problem? Will banning certain types of content prevent this, or perhaps shift it? Instead of social media, would it be preferable if children were playing games on their phone? If they were then "addicted" to gaming or socialising around a popular game, would the proposal be at that point to ban children from playing games on their phone? To me, it seems the problem is less the content and more that the environment is setup in certain ways that allows this. It is unclear to me how banning and gating certain content will prevent this.
> different campaigners care about different aspects, so I'm going to talk about the one I care about: addiction, destroyed ability to focus, and dopamine desensitization
What kind of things are you pushing outside of banning material and gating access? Is there a push for educating parents of the dangers of this "addiction"? Perhaps informing people about how to use parental controls to limit the access their children have? Is there a push on companies to provide robust, and easy-to-use parental controls? I feel that parents should have the tools, yet it seems that we consider the problem out of the parents control. Why is that? If parents make an informed choice and choose differently to you, should they be allowed to do so?
> I don't care if adults are vulnerable, they have to make their own decisions.
I feel that if you are caring about children accessing "addicting" material that you should also care about your fellow citizens accessing the same. How would those adults know that this material is addictive? Are they being informed by the state? What avenues are there for them to get help? It seems that the OSA and this VPN age check do not provide any assistance to people that are perhaps already addicted, or preventing people from falling into that trap. Does the care only extend to children and no further? Should we care about building sturdy adults regardless if they are currently children or not?
My general thoughts on this is that there appears to be a lot of restriction and preventing people from accessing certain content, however very little on informing people on what those perceived dangers are. The UK government is especially keen on this restriction, yet I am seeing no push towards informing people, or providing assistance for those afflicted. To me, the proposed motivation and the implementation are incongruent with each other. The perception of safety, as opposed to an improvement in real world safety.
But your methods are flawed. I'm not even sure I can follow the logic of your post. You're talking about doing school work on iPads at school, so we must make everyone give their personal identifying information to VPNs? How does that follow?
The main problems I have with your methods:
1. You're forcing everyone in the UK to expose their personal identifying data to third party companies who *will* leak the data at some point.
2. You're forcing children to work around this and they *will* work around it and end up on websites that definitely do not have their best intentions in mind. I think your hammer approach is going to partly work, but have some extreme negative outcomes. Will you raise your hand for the harm this causes?
I'd suggest digesting what I'm saying here, really looking strongly at your aims and think if there are better alternatives.
Here is what I would like:
Whenever a UK citizen browses a social media site, I'd mandate banners that advertise the harms of social media, and also mandate that they can view the algorithm that is being used to feed them.
I plan on providing safe ways to browse the internet for my children when they're old enough. I'll give them their own VPN if needed, again with necessary precautions and education.
So ignorant pop pseudo-neuroscience. Got it.
> It's not fair to say "banning doesnt work you should just not give your children phones", but then force you to send your children to schools that give them ipads and other distractions.
Books can also be distractions. Ask me how I know. And I notice that you're just silently shifting back and forth between "social media" (ever notice how there's no single agreed-upon definition of that in the world?) and "just anything you can do on an iPad".
> in many schools EVERY child is on social media
Yes, because the world at large uses social media for some things. And for that matter uses things other than social media, things you or your coalition want to deprive children of, for other things. What you are effectively asking is to stick everybody who's not officially an adult in a curated sandbox that will never match the richness of the rest of society. That is unfair, unreasonable, and basically a guaranteed way to fail to prepare them for actual adulthood.
Easier to enforce, you don't have to rely on the very same companies that peddle the thing you're trying to ban in the first place. It can disrupt the network effects that could hopefully be enough to let people voluntarily cut it out of their lives. People are primed to get rid of it, but can't because it is so addicting and said network effects.
And then every time a country actually tries to ban children from the internet, they cry "but my privacy!!!" As if having to hand your id to the state to use the internet isn't exactly what you asked for. As if the regimes most interested in "protecting the kid" aren't exactly the ones who puts you in jail for a meme too spicy.
You reap what you sow. Congrats on making the internet worse.
Nothing suprises me anymore in the UK. It's been extremely dystopian for a long time.