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Discord Users Threaten Exodus Over Age Verification Face Scan Controversy (www.newsweek.com)
submitted 7 months ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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Starting in early March, the platform will place every account into a default "teen-appropriate" experience unless it has proof that users are adults.

The move has brought widespread criticism from Discord users, who are citing privacy and security concerns following a recent breach of a third-party vendor that ended up exposing around 70,000 government ID images used to verify the age of Discord users.

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[–] 23 points 7 months ago (6 children)

Someone on Reddit claims reddit will do the same soon. I wonder if it's govt pressure.

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  • [–] 31 points 7 months ago

    I assume it's UK/EU's expanding social media laws that are driving this, in addition to Discord's imminent Initial Public Offering coming in March. They're trying to clean house to show how profitable they can be, the same way Reddit created their walled garden by restricting third-party connections prior to their IPO.

    It's bog-standard enshittification to please the shareholders.

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  • [–] 18 points 7 months ago (1 child)

    Lots of governments want it. But its no excuse doing it in a stupid way. For example EU IDs should have a function that just verifies someone is over 18 without any other info being send. At least the German one does. But its not being used.

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  • [–] 14 points 7 months ago*

    It's not being used because the real goal is to make it impossible to use the internet without handing over your ID, so that governments can know exactly what you do online. It goes along with all the attempts to ban or backdoor encryption including VPNs. They want to read every message and know who sent it and to whom.

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  • [–] 14 points 7 months ago (1 child)

    potentially. it's going to become more of the norm as more nations enforce stuff like this to "protect the kids" coughget your id and know what you're doing onlinecough

    Also keep in mind Discord is just about to launch their IPO in March so the timing lines up.

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  • [–] 6 points 7 months ago*

    The EU is going to pass a law to enforce this, discord is just getting ahead of the imposition. That's why France and Spain have been on the news regarding social network regulation for under 16.

    So when you have to setup a system for 27 countries plus some members of the eurosphere you just do it for everyone and be done with it.

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