This appears to be part of the “Parents Decide Act” announced earlier in April by Gottheimer, as just one step in the process. So expect a lot more to come. Some bullet point plans from it:
- Require operating system developers like Apple and Google to verify users’ ages when setting up a new device, rather than relying on self-reported ages.
- Allow parents to set age-appropriate content controls from the start, including limiting access to social media, apps, and AI platforms.
- Ensure that age and parental settings securely flow to apps and AI platforms, so content is tailored appropriately for children.
- Prevent children from accessing harmful or explicit content - including inappropriate AI chatbot interactions - by creating a consistent, trusted standard across platforms.Currently, the bill is only in the introductory stage so it hasn’t yet passed and become law, so if this is important to you in the US you may want to speak to your representatives.
Source [web-archive]
I am sorry, but isn’t it 99% not about “children protection” but general surveillance for everyone wrapped up in a “pretty” package that plays, again, on fears as the parenting and unforeseen future backed up with the “time-saving” features for those who are in a hurry within the same system?
Downvote because your post is mostly tribalism. It’s “us users” vs “them evil state who want to surveil us”.
Have you actually spent time considering whether age verification is beneficial? Whether parents think that their children spend too much time online, or whether the teenagers think that themselves? Have you taken their input and concerns serious?
Many people i know irl are saying that children should spent less time online and maybe only in cleaner parts of the internet, which excludes a lot of sites. and they’re not saying that because they want to surveil everyone, but because they want to live a simple, unworried life that keeps them away from danger.
I think headbashing won’t bring us anywhere, we need to listen to people’s concerns and take them seriously, and respond with clever wits and thorough analysis.
oh and before any of you say “well, parents already have the ability to limit what children can do on their smartphones”. well, i did a lot of surveys about who knows these abilities, and who uses them, including here on lemmy, and the result is pretty bleak. 99.9% of people don’t know in parental controls, and many believe that there are no effective parental controls today. if you think otherwise, please provide examples.
if you think for one second that anything requiring digital ID or age verification in the united states under this current fascist regime will be anything but a detriment to the american people who are already being stolen from their homes, beaten, tortured, raped, killed, and shipped off to foreign countries, separating children from their families, they are raping children in ICE detention facilities so commonly that there is a noticeable rise in underage pregnancy inside these facilities. many of which go missing after the fact.
this streamlines child abduction for ICE agents and therefore streamlines child sex trafficking in the united states as a side effect of increased surveillance over the entire united states population.
quit being naive.
if parents really cared about their children online, they would either get them a dumb phone or even simply google how to install parental controls on their cellphones, routers, desktops, laptops, pads, etc.
having the state (especially this state) being responsible for parenting your children will leave them exposed to to fascism, fascistic ideals, and becoming victims themselves of trafficking and abuse by authority.
your entire post reads like someone who is terribly, terribly misinformed on the dangers and implications of this kind of state/federal level of control over the internet. and what that means not only for the children, but also whistle blowers, protestors, resistance members, unions, and average every day people like you who think that following the rules will keep you and your loved ones safe from harm.
being a good well natured person in the united states is quite literally punishable by death in the eyes of the law. keeping your head down and out of the way, following the rules, its as good as being complicit in fascism itself.
this law is fascist. end. of. story.
sorry you were mislead by billions of dollars worth of propaganda that makes it seem like a good idea.
Yes, and it’s not.
That has no bearing on whether or not every single website, advertising service , and application needs access to my PII.
Yes, but if they aren’t willing to take responsibility for themselves or their children, then I don’t really give those concerns much weight.
If ‘99.9% of people don’t know any parental controls, and many believe that there are no effective parental controls today’ is true then adding Government surveillance to the problem doesn’t help especially when children are much more tech savvy than your average poli and will find a workaround in about a week. You are also assuming that the parental controls they implement are going to be easy to navigate. I think it would be far easier to create new laws that make social media liable for harmful or explicit content they allow on their platforms.
That’s not tribalism, that’s holding your elected officials accountable.
Let’s go best case scenario for ya: How exactly is a law requiring more parental controls supposed to help parents who already don’t know how to use the parental controls available to them? Won’t this just be yet another thing they don’t bother to understand?