Illinois just passed a law that puts Linux on the hook for age verification

It's none of your business. Go pound sand.

I don't understand how you are actually going to be able to enforce this when Linux is not "owned" by a single company.

Also how is that fine going to work if you don't have any children?

Oh come on guys, don't...

Can't believe all this shit just allowed to happen then Muricans still claiming to have more freedom than China or Russia for long..

These laws still do not sit well with me. This is just going to create endless lawsuits. In my opinion the safer choice would be to avoid doing anything with current teens, that's just a non starter. Instead think of sliding windows of time and sandbox small children on a child account that if all goes well will one day be a teen and then an adult. They will thank you when they are an adult for looking out for them when they were too young to consent to the data leaked by these laws.

Why not just signal age ranges? Simple, the way the legal system works is one puts in a benign sounding law, then tweak it every year since the mechanism exists. (scope creep) "Now add city, state", "Now add DOB and address", "Now add your federal wallet ID."

- For small children set an RTA header (previous discussions) [1] for any URL that may potentially contain content not appropriate for small children. Give site operators 1 year to implement this. Not counting QA and change control this takes minutes.

- Require app and device vendors to create a properly sand-boxed child account. Pen test it but it does not have to be perfect. This is for small children and default installed applications. If the child visits a URL that contains the RTA header then trigger parental controls. It is entirely up to the parent when that child is ready for mature content. It must be impossible for the child to install any applications, addons, etc... There are a myriad of ways to accomplish this.

- How is this enforced? Same way as any other parenting issue. If there is an incident that involves law enforcement, then social services can investigate and determine if negligence was occurring. When the child is mentally mature enough to deal with all the crap that is the internet their account is converted to an adult account. If the parent is giving the child an adult account before they are ready then the parent(s) go to mandatory parental training. If the child was being bullied or groomed, redirect law enforcement to go after the bullies or groomers.

- Set the laws to be active for any small child that would be under 13 as of the year 2034. Presto! One need not try to confine teens. When these small children are teens they will either be used to the sandbox account or the parent may have converted the account to adult.

As a side note all public and private schools should be legislated to have classes on dealing with all the crap the internet has to offer. Bullies, Cry-bullies, Trolls, Groomers, Scammers, Devious companies, Astroturfers, Gas Lighters, Propagandists, NGO's and so on. Also teach and help them build friend networks so there is protection in numbers. No child should be friendless.

[1] - https://nochan.net/b/Internet-Crap/20230829-Think-Of-The-Chi...

I predicted this would happen. Others also predicted this would happen.

I think now even the last person realises that this has nothing to do with age "verification". They simply hate us for our freedom. And it is clearly a move coordinated by private business here; their lobbyists are acting. This is also why it is the same law essentially in so many different countries at the same time. It is quite fascinating to watch, actually. People used to say "conspiracy nut!" - well, the facts are too clear now. That's no longer a conspiracy.

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One doesn't make Linus disappear for some time and then arrive apologizing for stubborness and embracing the imposed CoC just for the heck of it.