To be pretty annoyed/creeped out by this incoming internet age verification thing

[Fragmentedbrain]

Kids are as good as anyone at VPNs. It's just going to open adults up to blackmail and state control.

Also if you don't want your kids looking at adult material maybe don't let them have a smartphone until they're 16.

Should have read identity verification, not age verification. The only reason this is being pushed is so that big brother can watch every single thing you do online, at all times. They've literally arrested people for tweets and anybody who is in favour of this is either dumb as a bag of hammers or is in the Burn The Witch if she disagrees with me camp.

As I said, we already have to provide proof of age to buy alcohol and other goods over the internet. IRL you have to provide proof of age to purchase pornography.

What's your problem with verifying your age so you can access pornography on the internet?

If you're online, you're being watched more than you're watching. You'd be a fool to think otherwise.

If you fear your Internet porn consumption will lead to a bad outcome for you, dont consume Internet porn. You dont have to. Its not a human need or a human right or anything like that.🤷‍♀️

The more content filters there are on the Internet and the less people use it the better in my opinion. Its hugely damaging to society and individuals in many ways.
If you're doing or accessing something on the internet that you don't want others to know about then it's probably not a good thing, and also not good for you.

Sorry you're a porn addict and fixated on porn, I don't watch any porn at all.

Move on.

Nope. Not using it is one thing, Big Brother compiling lists of people who have views they disagree with is another.

No more anonymous GC tweets that's for sure

(I am also regularly surprised at how prudish many Mumsnet users are about sexual content too - feel a bit sad for them)

It's not prudish really. Lots of women in porn are coerced/forced etc. We don't like it.

Porn isn't sex of course, it's filmed prostitution usually and at best totally unrealistic. And kids never need to see that, of course.

I feel really sad for anybody who would pretend not to know this, in case that was a dig at anyone who doesn't want kids to see porn.

https://assets.childrenscommissioner.gov.uk/wpuploads/2023/05/Evidence-on-pornographys-influence-on-harmful-sexual-behaviour-among-children.pdf

I don't think it's prudish to not want women and girls to be shown as orifices for men's (in the main) pleasure. Most sex workers I have met have come from abusive or neglected backgrounds.
Don't feel sad that we don't get off on other's pain.
Also in a selfish level I'm up for less porn if possible. All the blokes I have slept with who are into porn have been rubbish in bed 😂

I was reading about Reddit doing this - apparently you have to upload a "selfie" or "government ID". I might be missing something, but what's to stop an underage person uploading someone else's ID, especially the 'selfie'? I won't be doing it, anyway. If it's asked for in relation to anything I want to look at, I just won't bother.

I'd go one further.

I'd like access to the Internet to requite your national insurance number, similar to South Korea.

It would be a much better place if everyone had to be accountable for their words, threats and actions.

Ok, you go first. Name, address and telephone number, credit card details and national insurance number will do to start. You can just send it to me by DM, I promise to do nothing bad with it.

And that promise is precisely as safe as Big Brother Online Nanny Database having access to everything.

I hate to make you paranoid, but I'm pretty sure the government already have access to all of that anyway? That's how it works in Korea, bit different to giving all of your details to a random.

Trustworthy companies have data protection, so maybe don't visit any dodgy sites?

As an aside, the amount of men panicking that their porn abuse watching history may become public is nothing short of hilarious.

They are asking for videos now, in many places. Facebook in Aus wants you to make a video of your face before they will let you have an account. I imagine all the other good soldiers for the Red Army will fall in line soon too.

If I can't access sites without Big Brother having my info, I just won't access the site, whatever it is.

Nope, it is precisely the same as giving your information to a random - that's precisely what you are doing.

I hate to make you sound daft, but the point is that you should be able to have thoughts that the government does not approve of online and even be "offensive" without the government being able to track you down and add you to a Red Army database of dissidents. Particularly considering you get arrested for thought crimes in the UK now - and don't pretend you are unaware of this trend.

So I will continue to do what I have always done and use throwaway emails and VPNs when posting commentary or reading anything I wish to read, as it's absolutely none of the government's business and they very definitely cannot be trusted with that sort of power.

Porn is nothing to do with this discussion, I have been saying we need age verification on porn for 20 years, because kids should never have access to porn. So if you are panicking that your porn use is about to be discovered, you're all alone there, it's nothing to me at all being that I don't watch porn.

The point is that they are pretending to protect kids while planning to make lists of dissenting adults.

The governments National ID push.

The Afghan Data leak suggests the Government shouldn’t be trusted with our data.

Criminals will still commit crime.
Children will still access porn.
Our data will be at a greater risk of being leaked to criminals.

Pedophiles with child abuse on their hard drive will still get a slap on the wrist from a judge.

At which point people will start to improve their knowledge of tech and start to put the skids under their sprogs.

Well, you live in hope.

This.

Sexual predators/revenge porn people and keyboard warrior bullies are really the only ones who need to worry.

I personally think you should be happy to back up anything you do or say on the Internet. If you feel shame or guilt then you're probably doing something wrong.

Maybe people like the fox rescue lady wouldn't have killed herself because of online bullies if they knew there was records of who was saying what.

Yes of course there's ways this can be abused if the wrong political party starts getting scary influence (and I believe this to be a potential for both sides) but at least for the time being the good will far outweigh the bad.

I also wish they would spend more time and energy trying to figure out how to get into these anonymous messaging services and sites where people distribute child sexual assault material.

Nah. Anyone who says anything the government disagrees with will be put on a database. If you don't think this is the plan you have not paid any attention at all to history.

They're not trying to do anything about kids seeing porn and pedophiles, because they don't care about that, only about strangling any dissent and preventing anyone speaking words the government doesn't like.

It won’t change anything
a popular VPN with kids used to be Hide My Ass when it was free 😆
there are loads of free VPNs so all kids will do is get one

all the age verification will do is hide it out of site from the moral sex brigade

you get more porn on x and ticktock than on most adult sites

porn hub blocked itself from France recently
the use of VPNs went through the roof
same for Florida

the porn genie has been out of the. Bottle far to long for any effective way to get rid of it
it will just be underground & out of site

might go and invest in a a few VPN shares

I agree that is a scary risk. Do you have any suggestions for how to stop bullies and predators? We are seeing so many horrible things happening because people are anonymous.

(Promise I am not saying that in a goady way, I genuinely think this is an interesting topic).

Agree it should be restricted to that area