Apple Is Bringing Age Verification To Texas This Week

Apple Is Bringing Age Verification To Texas This Week (theverge.com) 30 joshuark shares a report from The Verge: Apple will introduce age verification in the App Store for users in Texas starting on Thursday, June 4th. The move, as spotted by MacRumors, comes just days after a federal appeals court allowed Texas' App Store Accountability Act to go into effect while a lawsuit against it proceeds. People in Texas who are creating a new Apple account will need to verify they're over 18 using a credit card or government ID. Apple may also automatically verify users' age using the age of their account and whether they have a credit card on file. Despite Apple's attempts to push back on app store-level age verification, the company has announced plans to implement age checks to comply with laws in places like Utah, Louisiana, Brazil, Australia, Singapore, and the UK. Google is required to make similar changes to the Play Store and is also introducing age-checking tools for developers. Last December, a judge blocked the App Store Accountability Act (SB 2420) from taking effect, but an appeals court has now reversed this decision -- at least while the court figures out whether the law is constitutional. Even if this law gets struck down in Texas, a federal version with the same name is still making its way through Congress and could impose age verification at the app store nationwide. Despite Apple's attempts to push back on app store-level age verification, the company has announced plans to implement age checks to comply with laws in places like Utah, Louisiana, Brazil, Australia, Singapore, and the UK. Google is required to make similar changes to the Play Store and is also introducing age-checking tools for developers. Last December, a judge blocked the App Store Accountability Act (SB 2420) from taking effect, but an appeals court has now reversed this decision -- at least while the court figures out whether the law is constitutional. Even if this law gets struck down in Texas, a federal version with the same name is still making its way through Congress and could impose age verification at the app store nationwide. Mixed Feelings (Score:2) Re:Mixed Feelings (Score:4, Funny) On the other hand, I don't necessarily want kids under a certain age to be viewing hard-core porn and kink websites. Still, how many of us straight guys didn't "borrow" a father's Playboy magazine to look at images of the female body in junior high and later before online porn exited? I did for the articles. Re: (Score:1) to be viewing hard-core porn and kink websites sounds unrelated pretty sure both there's a whole shitload industry and community answers that will tell you what ARE more plausible solutions that are less about tracking the population and more about keeping a device from doing that not including the OS settings checkbox we've already had for decades for people who "don't necessarily want kids under a certain age to be viewing hard-core porn and kink websites" Re: (Score:1) I don't necessarily want kids under a certain age to be viewing hard-core porn and kink websites To abstract: I don't want X bad thing, therefore I am going to accept Y bad thing. You need to establish that impacts of X >>> impacts of Y. My view is that massive hit to privacy for everyone does not justify marginal reduction of exposure of minors to adult material. Why marginal? Because age verification alone is not going to eliminate/prevent it. Re: (Score:1) No law works perfectly at keeping kids away from age-inappropriate things. I was riding the commuter train the other day and ended up sitting near a very young teenager with one of those really souped up e-bikes. Another passenger asked him how fast it goes, he replied "80" (that'd be MPH, as I'm in the US). Kid is probably gonna unalive himself on that thing, but that's bad parenting for ya. Re: (Score:2) Apple already doesn't allow apps where the primary focus is porn. This is ostensibly so apps can provide an age-appropriate experience (that aspect is actually kind of a good thing), but it's mostly about enforcing social media age restriction laws. The whole reason why it's trivially easy to bypass with a parent's ID or credit card is because, if you look at Texas's social media age laws - that's exactly how it's supposed to work. If you're under 18, you're not supposed to be on social media without your Re: (Score:2) Ban porn and gambling online. Treat it as publicly visible airwaves. (actually doing that effectively is probably impossible) Re: (Score:2) Re: Finally! (Score:4, Funny) Because no one lies or has fake ids or a vpn (Score:3) Re: (Score:2) "For our side, circumvention is the only option." Who is this "our"? It's a long way down (Score:2) It just sucks to be a Slashdot old-timer (lost my less than 4-digit ID when usa.net died suddenly and I couldn't recover the accou Re: (Score:2) "some communist-loving far left" Reading something political into this thread other than the fact of someone having used the word "authoritarianism" is all on you. Re: (Score:2) For our side, circumvention is the only option. If you're not a kid, you're likely not going to even need to circumvent anything. Apple already knows I'm an adult based on my account age and the fact I have an Apple Card. I'm sure Florida's next in line to do pass a similar law and all it will amount to is a pop-up saying I didn't need to do anything to verify my age. Hell, even getting carded in real life is like "Birth year starts with 19xx? You're good." Texas Nanny State.. (Score:2, Insightful) Re: (Score:3) Is it? Amazing how easily fooled people are. Re: (Score:1) Re: (Score:2) Tracks with Christian Nationalism, government surveillance, and corporate oligarchy. Re: (Score:2) How is this not compelled speech? (Score:1) Re: (Score:2) You are not, any more than you are "compelled" against your constitutional rights to provide an ability to pay when making a purchase. Papers please! (Score:2) Identify yourself, citizen! Big Brother is watching. Everything you do on your phone or computer will be logged, and any suspicious patterns of activity will be flagged as grounds for detention while an in-depth investigation is performed. Don't be alarmed, most people will be released -eventually. Re: (Score:2) You can't even drive or walk down certain roads in border states without getting harassed for papers. So at least the authoritarianism is consistently applied to both real and virtual reality. Re: (Score:2) Doesn't the App Store on Apple (Score:2) also issue updates including security updates? Won't this stop people from using the store leaving potentially vulnerable machines? Re: (Score:2)