I support this move. Some here are delusionally arguing that this impacts privacy - the sort of data social media firms collect on teenagers is egregiously extensive regardless. This is good support for their mental health and development.
Anything that does not force ID verification is useless.
Anything that does verify ID would mean that adults also have to upload their IDs to the website.
What will happen is either this becomes another toothless joke. Or the government say "okay this isn't working, lets implement ID checks", and when that law passes Lemmy Instance Admins would be required to verify ID of any user from an Australia IP.
Y'all want that to happen?
So what hapoens if other countries start catching on and also pass such law?
Eventually the all internet accounts would be tied to IDs. Anonymity is dead.
Government provided open id service which guarantees age. Website gets trusted authority signed token witch contains just the age. We can do this safely. We have the technology. They could even do it only once on registration.
Digital id's exist already in the EU, and many countries run a sign on service already. We aren't far from this.
No. I don't want governments to know what social media I use, nor do I want social media to know what country I'm a citizen of. I don't want any connection between the two.
"This user has been verified to be at least [Age]. Sincerely, [Government Authority]" Assuming this is an identical token thats the same for everyone? Sure. I'm not opposed to this.
"This user has been verified to be at least [Age]. Unique Token ID: 23456" Hell No. When the government eventually wants to deanonymize someone, they could ask the website: "What was the token ID that was used to verify the user?" then if the website provides it, now the government can just check the database to see who the token belongs to. And this could also lead to the government mandating the unique token id to be stored.
This ban is a wake up call to Tech Industry to implement and enforce rules against hate speech, grooming, fake news, etc.
They surely cannot verify the age of a human without any official ID made in the real world.
This leads to other problems but that's not the concern of the government! Social Media wants it's users, not the government.
what? Why would tech industry care? If anything it'll have the reverse effect and dimiss tech role in brain rott because "see, kids are not on it! It's all good here"
If i recall correctally, Australia tried to fine adults if they didnt have thier phone with them. Ive heard a relaible youtuber say it, but i couldnt find a news article to confirm it.
How can you look at the state of things pretty much everywhere since social media has become so ubiquitous and think that it has no effect on people, young people especially? It's full of hate, envy, propaganda, and brainwashing
There is no published science definitively proving that it is harmful or helpful. The effects of this particular legislation, if it is impactful at all, remains to be seen. I'm just offering my opinion based on my personal experiences. I expect it to have some success in reducing acute adolescent mental health issues. If the matter is ever settled through consensus, I'll defer to that.