a lot of people. The other day I saw a post on mastodon by some politician or someone in the UK stating that if people find any site that is geoblocking the UK because of the age verification to report it to some link he provided. it was boosted A LOT with a lot of replies in support.

bootlickers.

I legitimately dont understand who supports this. Who are these parents that can't parent their kids properly? It's so incredibly easy these days.

So instead of handling shitty parenting we restrict adults and with surveillance. Make it make sense.

See, there are a few ways this could go.

1. Age verification is as secure and private as promised, and it's left at that. I like to call this "the miracle", and we all know those don't happen.

2. Age verification is as secure and private as promised, but a government asks for "access to data to prevent crime" - things degenerate from there. This is the "systemic failure" scenario.

3. Age verification is as secure and private as promised, but new scams evolve around it to make it dangerous. This would be the "criminal element" scenario.

4. Age verification is not as secure and private as promised, and a leak occurs destroying lives and careers. This is the "system failure" scenario.

5. Age verification is as secure and private as promised, but a few companies start scraping and selling data, leading to widespread harms. This is the "unethical merchant" scenario, and the most likely outcome.

All in all, there is only one "ok" scenario, and a lot of horrific ones. The math says we're entirely boned ^_^

See, there are a few ways this could go.

1. Age verification is as secure and private as promised, and it's left at that. I like to call this "the miracle", and we all know those don't happen.

2. Age verification is as secure and private as promised, but a government asks for "access to data to prevent crime" - things degenerate from there. This is the "systemic failure" scenario.

3. Age verification is as secure and private as promised, but new scams evolve around it to make it dangerous. This would be the "criminal element" scenario.

4. Age verification is not as secure and private as promised, and a leak occurs destroying lives and careers. This is the "system failure" scenario.

5. Age verification is as secure and private as promised, but a few companies start scraping and selling data, leading to widespread harms. This is the "unethical merchant" scenario, and the most likely outcome.

All in all, there is only one "ok" scenario, and a lot of horrific ones. The math says we're entirely boned ^_^

See, there are a few ways this could go.

1. Age verification is as secure and private as promised, and it's left at that. I like to call this "the miracle", and we all know those don't happen.

2. Age verification is as secure and private as promised, but a government asks for "access to data to prevent crime" - things degenerate from there. This is the "systemic failure" scenario.

3. Age verification is as secure and private as promised, but new scams evolve around it to make it dangerous. This would be the "criminal element" scenario.

4. Age verification is not as secure and private as promised, and a leak occurs destroying lives and careers. This is the "system failure" scenario.

5. Age verification is as secure and private as promised, but a few companies start scraping and selling data, leading to widespread harms. This is the "unethical merchant" scenario, and the most likely outcome.

All in all, there is only one "ok" scenario, and a lot of horrific ones. The math says we're entirely boned ^_^

Well time to sell thumbdrives to teenagers filled with "tutorials.mp4" and "online class.mp4" lol.

It is not age verification.

It is privacy invading, morality policing, de-anonymizing, state surveillance.

Nothing less.

PS. If you want to download a video from a site that doesn't have a download button, use the Inspect feature (right click on the page, not the video, and click inspect)

*On the Network tab - Sort by size. Reload page. Find the video. Open the video in new tab. It will be just the video. Right click and save as, or click the download button, or click the 3 dot menu button and select download.

On Firefox you can often bypass this entirely by shift + right click. And should see a save video as option. If not, the inspect feature works the same.

For hls/TS videos (m3u8 streams), if you reallllly want, you can copy the link for the stream and use VLC to convert the stream to a file.

This also often lets you download at higher resolution than they offer to download.

Yes, I porn.

*forgot Network tab

And thanks for all the suggestions. I'd rather not install browser plugins if I can do it without. CLI tools are cool though. The less I need to install the better.

I legitimately dont understand who supports this. Who are these parents that can't parent their kids properly? It's so incredibly easy these days.

So instead of handling shitty parenting we restrict adults and with surveillance. Make it make sense.

Totally in agreement. I think a bigger part of the issue is most people are completely tech illiterate. People can’t tell a computer from a monitor anymore and then we expect them to outsmart a kid with nothing better to do than stare at a screen for hours on end who will no doubt figure out ways around things. There has to be some feeling on the parents part of defeat. If only the politicians knew what the fuck they were doing we might get actual regulations for engineers to implement proper controls. The percentage of parents attempting to monitor their children appropriately while also having enough tech knowledge has to be low.

Is it going to get to a point we are better off self hosting and having offline copies that we share instead?

Most parents are way less literate than their kids. Most censorship/site restriction, can be circumvented easily.

report, lol. what does that douchebag want to do? fine a foreign website for not serving content to his oh so precious country?

I really, really dont want to search for porn on the dark net...

See, there are a few ways this could go.

1. Age verification is as secure and private as promised, and it's left at that. I like to call this "the miracle", and we all know those don't happen.

2. Age verification is as secure and private as promised, but a government asks for "access to data to prevent crime" - things degenerate from there. This is the "systemic failure" scenario.

3. Age verification is as secure and private as promised, but new scams evolve around it to make it dangerous. This would be the "criminal element" scenario.

4. Age verification is not as secure and private as promised, and a leak occurs destroying lives and careers. This is the "system failure" scenario.

5. Age verification is as secure and private as promised, but a few companies start scraping and selling data, leading to widespread harms. This is the "unethical merchant" scenario, and the most likely outcome.

All in all, there is only one "ok" scenario, and a lot of horrific ones. The math says we're entirely boned ^_^

This isn't about being "age-checked". It's about IDing everyone on the internet and tracking where they go and what they do.

The world we live in is far far worse than anything from 1984.

There's like a gazillion porn sites on the clearnet though, I can't imagine them being able to track then all

Or all of the above while still not being "as secure and private as promised".

I really, really dont want to search for porn on the dark net...

And if I can't, I'll just stop using the internet for anything I don't absolutely have to.

I don't really need my smartphone. A laptop will do.