Post by @ibboard@hachyderm.io

2026-09-18 08:25 UTC

@romli@social.vivaldi.net @markwyner@mas.to Half of the problem is untrustworthy providers. And when they're commercial entities then that's NEVER going to go away. Half of the problem is necessity, proportionality and appropriateness of age verification on social media. If the lawmakers REALLY cared about solving "addictive behaviour" and abuse and harmful content then they'd target the social media sites and make them implement better controls for EVERYONE, rather than age-gating it so that parents don't have to parent but then kids turn 18 and get dumped into all the addictive design, abuse and harmful content with no prior experience of it or how to handle it.

Replies (1)

@romli@social.vivaldi.net 2026-09-18 10:02

@ibboard@hachyderm.io @markwyner@mas.to Would totally agree verification organisations should never be commercial entities. These should be government run, highly secure and not for sale, in the same way as driving or passport authorities. However, I don't think it's necessarily governments job to remove 'addictive behaviour' in total. We still have cigarettes, alcohol, gambling various things that are bad for you. Once someone turns 18 then it is kind of their responsibility to navigate harms in the world. Having said that governments certainly can, and should, seek to limit the risks for everyone. We would all be better off if certain forms of corporate social media were severely throttled.

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