How is age verification to be done?

posted by TinyThomas
Posted on Thursday January 17, 2008 at 20:32. 960 visits. ( permalink )
As others said, I too appreciate the discussion before anything gets implemented "over night" - this is what I'd had expected to happen on the other site, back then.

Well. Personally, I do see the necessity for some kind of filtering mechanism, given that those legally entitled to see content will be able to.

So, for me it really comes down to how age verification is done - to withstand a legal charge it probably won't suffice to just trust the data entered by the user during registration.

For Pro Members, one could check via credit card - but how to do it for non-pro?

Team ipernity, what are your thoughts on this so far?

Regards,
TT

20 Replies

assbach pro says:
@IP: i will discuss this with a friend who is running adult-sites, maybe you still need some suggestions. you cannot start keeping an account inactive until you get a fax with the copy of a personal ID or something,number of the members ID card or whatever...this would be so "destructive", non-web2.0 ... . i am not sure
but i agree to tinythomas, age verification is THE important thing here.
Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
A Team ipernity pro says:
About age verification: age is calculated on the basis of birth date declared by members when signing up. We assume this is not 100% reliable, but there is no other 100% reliable age verification system. Our goal is not to replace parents role and responsibility but to prevent "as best as we can" unwanted access to inappropriate content.
Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
Nils Pickert pro replies:
Actually in germany there are plans for something reliable, involving the users to go somewhere offical, I believe the post office or something similar, pay something like 100 euro and get an ID which is certified and includes your age. This is mostly impracticable, fecking expensive and generally stupid. But that's the way they want it over here, as far as I remember...

If it is sufficient for french law to calculate the age from the given D.O.B. then by all means go for it :-) Anything which makes stuff complicated will scare people away.

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Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
-mcb replies:
>Actually in germany there are plans for something reliable, involving the users to ...

Really? Is there? Do you know where I can get some information about that?
In my view this plan is complete nonsense. There is a reliable age verification that everyone already has - but the appropriate reading device / software is missing (EC Karte).
Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
Iljuschin pro replies:
The only way that is officially leaglly for adult content is a so called "post ident"-procedure. The post identification works with a identity request send on paper which can only be fulfilled personally in a post office with your identity card. This means on the other hand that yor identity is complete open for the provider requested.

On the other hand there is always the question if the internet service we talk about is "provided" as a service is a content of the company of the internet service. Newest decicions made clear that ther is even with high level youth protection law no need to block google (!). So even if ipernity would have a german company part it is (as in the flickr case) not quite clear (because judgements are missing) if a service like this one is a providing service where the members are in fact responsible, not ipernity itself.

And: This all means german law, I do not know how this is in France. And: We all do not know what this means in EU law....
Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
TinyThomas pro says:
I appreciate the trust you have in your users, as much as the simplicity of this method. Does this suffice according to french law? (or EU law, in that matter)

I don't want you to build a barrier for entry into the site, but I also don't want you to get into deep trouble because some minor gets access to content based on his false declaration of age.

I'm not sure what french, EU or even german legal situation is on that matter.
Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
assbach pro replies:
true
Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
Sophie@ipernity pro says:
I think one important thing is not to let people change their age after registration... I'm sure minor people, realizing they cannot see everything on Ipernity, will get back to their profile to change their age.
Ok, they will also be able to create a new one, but it's still a first idea...

@TT, I'm sure you can understand how filtering mechanism is important from the point of view of 'family'... Browsing on Ipernity can also be a 'family moment', browsing in animal groups, or looking for pictures of specific location, to show children how high is the Effeil Tower, etc, etc, etc...
And I sometimes felt embarrassed, arriving in some particular streams...

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Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
TinyThomas pro replies:
To clarify - I am not against filtering at all, and I'm glad that the discussion is sought before implementation. Protection of minors is a good thing, but, as a paying user, I want to have the ability to see all content, should I so desire.

And I want Ipernity to be able to provide the service for some time to go, not see them crushed by lawsuits because of this issue - so IF filtering is going to be put in place, I do want a reliable age verification, to make this tight.

;)

Regards,
TT

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Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
Iljuschin pro replies:
This is not a solution. Maybe ipernity have to provide a family account where you can control the accounts of your kids. You are still not able to check if your kids are able to think a little bit and set up an non-pro account fro free when you let them surf around without sitting beside them. And: If this filter is working very fine and ther is *any* porn (I never seen here) or unwanted nudity (which you see in the steets all the time) there are still a lot of possibility to find other places not blocked by the best nanny-filter available. What I want so say: This is not a ipernity problem.
Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
Sophie@ipernity pro replies:
That's the wrong point. It IS Ipernity team problem as they are french and there are some french law they have to deal with.

Moreover, it's not only about children... I'd never leave my 5 y.o. daughter in front of a computer, but we often enjoy watching pics together, and we explore a lot Ipernity, looking for pets or for location we plan to go, or just watching our friends and relatives pics... I'd feel more secure if I'd know, in these moments, that I have a 'filter' preventing some 'bad' pics from appearing in the search results.

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Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
A Team ipernity pro says:
We haven't taken any decision and are listening to everyone's point of view. We'll answer in a couple of days with a new proposal which will be discussed again. Thanks to all for participating!
Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
beatmaster says:
well, since there are many user meetings, ipernity could do something like cacert.org ... that really would be "community style" *g*
first assume user's details concerning the age are correct, but let users say through a web form "hey, I met him/her, and his/her details are correct/wrong".

And if that works, ipernity could switch to "user must meet at least one other within one year"-mode.
Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
-mcb replies:
This only works in a tree structure. The first few people must authenticate via an ID or so and have to meet other people in real life (not only via instant messaging). So you'd have to authenticate a few persons and these will be very busy for a while.
We could combine this with the gpg/pgp web of trust. But people generally don't like the idea of encryption, so this might not be a feasible approach...
Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
beatmaster replies:
yes of course, that's why I would first assume correct values, that's how you'd have a lot for "trusted" people at once (and wouldn't change anything, as ipernity already planned to trust user input) ...
Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
-mcb replies:
Don't think that this is a good starting point. First trust all the users (new ones included) and then once a certain date has come stopping to trust the new ones and require a reputation. You have to start from a verified base, not an assumption.
Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
Dirk pro replies:
Forced user meeting... kinda...

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Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
beatmaster replies:
yes, with loose constraints :-)
Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
-mcb replies:
Right ;)
We should have a big key signing party...
Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink )
A Team ipernity pro says:
We've just published a new proposal. The discussion continues here: www.ipernity.com/group/36490/discuss/13963
Posted 21 months ago. ( permalink / translate )

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