Governments around the world are currently attempting to implement strict online child safety measures, fundamentally changing how everyday devices connect to the internet. As part of this push, lawmakers are looking past individual apps and targeting the underlying operating systems. They want the OS itself to verify a user’s age during initial setup. Colorado lawmakers […]

The coordinated effort worked. When lawmakers finalized Colorado SB26-051, they added Section 6-30-105(e) to the text. This specific clause waives compliance for operating systems and applications distributed under licenses that allow copying, modifying, and redistributing without platform-imposed technical restrictions. Why the Section 6-30-105(e) Exemption Protects Decentralized Tech

This exemption establishes a formal legislative precedent for the tech industry. It legally shields free and open-source operating systems from hardware-level age attestation laws that closed ecosystems like iOS and Windows will soon have to follow.

  • potatoguy@mbin.potato-guy.space
    27·
    3 days ago

    I’m already seeing that in a year or two, we’re getting blocked on websites or electron applications because of age verification just like in android with Google Play Services. Like use age verification software or get blocked for 99% the internet.

    They don’t even need to turn it into law.

    • fushuan@piefed.blahaj.zoneEnglish
      5·
      1 day ago

      Whatever device based verification those websites or electron apps were communicating with can be spoofed in a system where you have complete control.

      Games are cracked in weeks at most, don’t you think that whatever secure communication is established won’t be cracked lightning fast by the whole FOSS community? Once the “secure communication” between local apps is broken, a third package can mitm that shit easily. It’s a local environment.

    • Coldcell@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      22·
      2 days ago

      Honestly the faster they try to lock us out of the web the sooner we can get a second, freer web with card games and prostitution.

    • badgermurphy@lemmy.worldEnglish
      3·
      2 days ago

      That’s true and I bet its a big part of the plan. The good parts for us about that approach, though, is that the bad technology is baked into the services, not the user’s software, and the system depends on the tech oligopoly remaining. Laws are more durable than trends, so maybe that could be better for online privacy long-term, because the oligopoly will eventually break up. If we’re real lucky, some of them won’t survive the AI bubble aftermath enough to participate in this.