New York just proposed the most invasive state-level age verification bill the US has seen. Senate Bill S08102 would extend age verification requirements down to the device itself: internet-connected devices, operating system providers, and app stores would all be required to implement what the bill calls “age assurance” before users can access their own hardware and software ecosystems.
Edit:
Meta is one of the lobbyists for the age verification bill.
Into the Metaverse: The Money and Motivations Behind Meta’s App Store Gambit
In May 2025, Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) and Representative John James (R-MI) introduced the App Store Accountability Act (ASAA), a bill that would require app stores to verify users’ ages and obtain parental consent for users under 18. Meta has bankrolled a wildly expensive lobbying campaign to enact ASAA and its state-level analogs, and instead of recoiling in horror at taking kid privacy advice from Meta, some lawmakers are credulously going along with it.
Confirmed by Bloomberg : Meta Clashes With Apple, Google Over Age Check Legislation
The struggle has pitted Meta Platforms Inc. and other app developers against Apple Inc. and Alphabet Inc.’s Google, the world’s largest app stores. Lobbyists for both sides are moving from state to state, working to water down or redirect the legislation to minimize their clients’ risks.
This year alone, at least three states — Utah, Texas and Louisiana — passed legislation requiring tech companies to authenticate users’ ages, secure parental consent for anyone under 18 and ensure minors are protected from potentially harmful digital experiences. Now, lobbyists for all three companies are flooding into South Carolina and Ohio, the next possible states to consider such legislation.
in addition, there are Over 50 Child Advocacy Groups Unite to Demand App Store Accountability
Fucking cockroaches
Christian fundie groups trying to get rid of porn on the web. Other groups seeking to eliminate anonymity from the web.
Meta is likely going along with it because it protects them from child vulnerability lawsuits.
If they succeed in getting rid of internet porn, there will be only website and it would be www.bringbacktheporn.com
:D
… And based on usage, it’ll be run by a religious group. They consume the most porn, after all, and I bet this kind of bill is virtue-signaling or offloading of responsibility.
Politicians who unwaveringly support The King of the Pedophiles and a serial rapist think want me to believe they’re “protecting the children.”
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My head is going to explode
This is a good example for how democracy under capitalism tends to serve the interests of the Epstein class above the rest of us.
Weren’t the red hats the ones bitching about “the nanny state”?
Freedom for me, laws for thee
“Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit: There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.”
-someone smarter than me
The same crowd that needs the second amendment to stand up to tyranny but are nowhere to be found when tyranny is actually happening?
You mean the hypocrite amendment?
Yay! More places where devs will just say you can’t run their stuff.
I’m pretty sure I don’t need to use anything built by a company so preoccupied with my birthday.
Children aren’t purchasing their devices, adults are, so why would an adult need to prove that they’re over 18? They can just state that the individual receiving the device is under 18…. Oh so you’re saying it’s not actual about the safety of children?
They are infantilising people by making excuses that this is for the children. Teenagers may also be under 18, yet they don’t seem to care - they’re lumped right in with clueless children.
Teenagers are also people, and are closer to adults where they have their needs and wants. This goes against their safety, by duming them down. Its only a while since theyre going to consider under 25s as children as well - “for the peoples own good”.
“Child advocacy groups”, funded by billionaires.
If you can’t see it, you need to peel back a few more layers.
Fuck these people
You’ll need to verify your age for that too.
Here is the bill: https://docs.reclaimthenet.org/New-York-2025-S08102-Amended.pdf
Main points:
“Covered manufacturer” shall mean a manufacturer of an internet-enabled device, an operating system provider, or an application store.
Obligations for covered manufacturers.
- Upon activation of an internet-enabled device after the effective date of this article, a covered manufacturer shall conduct age assurance to determine a user’s age category at the point of such activation. For devices that were activated prior to the effective date of this article, however, such covered manufacturer shall conduct the age assurance described herein on or before such effective date.
Data security.
- A covered manufacturer or covered developer shall delete all information collected for the purposes of this article after such purpose has been achieved, except where necessary for compliance with applicable provisions of law or regulation.
So it would be any device that connects to the internet, regardless of the reason such as connecting to a VPN.
Gonna be weird to age verify yourself to use a smart thermostat.
Wait… It just verifies the age of whoever initially activated the device? Which might predate the bill, implying a long activation time?
Do the authors of this bill even live with children? Cuz they sure aren’t actually dealing with their device usage
Scammers and hackers around the world celebrated at getting their hands on your ID info.
… I really don’t want to have to stop using all fucking technology now. Ffs this is absolutely disgustingly absurd. EVERYTHING GETS HACKED I am not tying my ID and real name to literally everything I do on an electronic device…
Sorry, but they handed out pamphlets at Davos.
Well not actually Davis, a more important event that nobody’s heard of.
I’m usually left of centre, even a bit more to the left than that.
But all these liberal places passing these laws… They’re making it difficult not to change teams.
I don’t watch conservative mouthpieces on YouTube, just the literal reality of these badly thought-of, privacy nightmare laws… All a conservative would have to tell me is they would revert this, and I’d be hard pressed to vote otherwise.
They’re not getting the memo are they…
Apparently Louisiana was the first state to really push for this kind of stuff so I seriously doubt conservatives in government would stop pushing stuff like this either.
It’s one of those things that’s going to be inevitable… It’s always “FoR tHe KiDs” but it’s really about knowing exactly what every citizen is doing at all times so they can come after you for whatever displeases them.
Just to point out I’m Canadian and regardless of who started it. Saying they’ll vote Republican to avoid this stuff comes from substantial ignorance.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_media_age_verification_laws_in_the_United_States
The only spin I can see from the right side is they want to be so ass deep into your tech stack that they don’t even have to ask to verify who you are.
I’m also Canadian lol. The point I’m making is that if it has me thinking like this, imagine people who were truly on the fence.
They’re shooting themselves in the foot.
If you’re Canadian then you know “left of center” in American units is still to the right of center everywhere else in the world.
It’s absurd to see a democrat doing something and blame liberals for it.
I was talking about Canada, should have mentioned that. Carney brought up that he wants to look at the issue, and God damnit I will fight this thing or at least the version that’s going to put all of our data at risk.
If it passes anyway, then I cannot in good conscience vote for any party who approved age verification like it is done in the UK, Australia, and some States.
So you replied to an article about something happening in the US to talk about Canada without mentioning Canada anywhere in your original post?
The Republican supermajority in Ohio that passed ID checks for websites months ago thinks you’re a moron for continuing to blame only Democrats for this shit
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Lol that’s like saying you’d vote in favor of voter suppression laws in exchange for gun rights… yeeaaah no don’t do that lol
Don’t trust conservatives
In Canada our cons are dumb, but not brain dead like the US’.
I don’t want to vote for them.
But once age verification garbage enters the picture, I become a one-issue voter.
So as a one issue voter, you’d vote for the people doing the thing you don’t like more than the other group, instead of those doing it less?
And you called your cons dumb…
Hey after I fight tooth and nail, write opinion columns, write to all politicians I have access to, and create petitions, if all of this wasn’t enough, what else is there to do?
It’s not a sure thing in Canada, and maybe a party further left will vote against it and oppose it, in which case yeah I’d vote for that.
As a voters you don’t get much a choice. In any voting system there is a case where all your choices are for something you are a hard no on.
for starters, democrats are not leftists.
I’m not American lol
I’m saying they’re poisoning their own well with garbage like that.
again, they are not leftists. if anything they are poisoning the right wing capitalist well for anyone paying actual attention.
What a crazy hypothetical you made up, “left of center”, considering the Republican party was pushing for federal ID verification for online services years before Democrats caught up to speed. Red states brought this up first and resulted in multiple porn sites banning users in those states.
But yes, online censorship and corporate surveillance is a bipartisan issue in the two party system of fascists. You will not be able to “vote” these issues away.
The team with Palantir, Cambridge analytica, that team? Team Red is all about absolute freedom for the rich, not so much the plebs
Brought to you by the state that passed gun clip size limits effectively making 99.9% of the standard issue carry for law enforcement illegal with no exception.
These people are morons and only concerned with controlling you.
