AB-1043 “Age verification signals: software applications and online services.”
Text https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=202520260AB1043
Other info https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202520260AB1043
California AB 1043 signed. Mandatory os-level, device-level, app store, and even developer-required age verification for all computing devices.
Good luck enforcing that on Linux.
That’s probably the point.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Microsoft and Google lobbied for this to prevent open source from encroaching on their terf
Likely yes, though it won’t matter to me. I’ll recompile from suitably modified source code if it comes to that.
They might try to stop Linux from booting at all with locked bootloaders.
There’s precedent that source code is protected speech, so maybe Gentoo is about to become a lot more popular.
And who doesn’t enjoy using 90% of their system resources to compile the 10% remainder all the time?
This is probably the most dystopian child safety bill so far.
Most dystopian “child safety” bill. Let’s not legitimize the claim that these laws are made to protect children while having privacy-invading side effects - they are privacy-invading laws disguised as child protection, while failing to have any real impact on children’s online safety and wellbeing
I’m not sure anything this repressive is implemented anywhere in the world.
Edit: wait this is the other half of the thing everywhere else is doing that would make this nightmare shit.
The only thing that I can think of is how China regulates it’s online gaming.
What is China’s Age Verification System?
China’s Age Verification System or 游戏适龄提示 in Chinese, is a government-mandated infrastructure that restricts minors’ access to online games and digital platforms. In China, all users must undergo “Real Name Verification” (实名认证) before accessing gaming services, enabling platforms to enforce age-appropriate restrictions automatically.
The system is overseen by the National Press and Publication Administration (NPPA) and integrates with national databases to verify user identities in real-time.
https://appinchina.co/blog/the-complete-guide-to-chinas-age-verification-system/
The move to do this was largely in part thanks to complaints of parents in regards to their kids’ habits with gacha games. For anyone interested, what I posted was a small excerpt from the link, there’s a lot more info on it there.
Is it in the OS?seems like just games.
It is similar, not the same. Some other key differences to consider are that while the US one is at the OS level, it’s just asking you to provide an age that isn’t linked to your ID or anything. It’s just like when a website asks your age, you can absolutely lie about it. But now it’s being done on the OS account, not the website.
Whereas, yeah, it is just for games in China, but it is absolutely being run against the person’s ID in a national database. Some games even require facial recognition. So it’s on a whole other level of verification and tracking.
Please update your title to remove the misinformation about the bill, specifically calling it “OS-level ID verification” is not even close. It’s not got anything to do with personally identifying information or any actual verification of age information.
It’s actually an incredibly privacy conscious method of doing what it is trying to do, which is to allow parents to set up a child’s account with their age information on a device and have that age bracket information passed to websites and applications. That way, it makes it harder for a child to bypass age-restrictions, but without requiring dangerous age verification methods such as ID or face scans.
~~I have edited the title to include “age verification checks” from “ID check”. ~~
