alt Hacker News> The apps and websites should broadcast the age rating of their content, and the OS fetches that age rating, and decides whether the content is appropriate by comparing the age rating to the user's age.
How would you make that happen? Many websites would not be subject to your jurisdiction.
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So? The same problem exists for having the OS broadcast the user's age range to all apps/services/websites: the service outside your jurisdiction doesn't have to actually restrict content based on age.
At least with the reverse system (services broadcast an age rating), you have some nice properties:
1. You can set it up so that if the service doesn't broadcast an age rating, access is denied.
2. You aren't leaking age information (even if it's just a range) to random websites outside your jurisdiction.
We're actually seeing this play out right now with the server-based age assurance systems which are already widely deployed and mandated under the UK Online Safety Act and laws in about 25 US States. In many cases, the sites just comply, presumably because they are worried that the regulators have a way to reach them even if they aren't hosted in the relevant jurisdiction. In some cases, however, the sites just ignore the regulations or tell the regulators to pound sand, as 4Chan is doing with UK OfCom: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c624330lg1ko
Assume they're 18+ then.
But even that's still not a great solution. I outline a better solution that doesn't require any legal enforcement at all, in the link at the bottom of my original comment.