Zero-knowledge proofs exist, where a person can prove one fact without revealing other facts about themselves. If there were a will to do it, governments could figure out a way for people to prove their age to a website without revealing their identity. The problem is that it was never supposed to be about proving your age, because what governments and corporations actually want is your identity for surveillance purposes. Proof of age and protection of children was just the cover story they used to promote the destruction of online anonymity. The goal is surveillance and control, not protection of children.

I agree completely, people are manipulated into believing this sort of thing is remotely OK - but its fundamentaly not. Not only does this infringe on peoples privacy but also human and youth rights which are clearly dismissed. The targeted minority is used like tools, sacrificing their rights for mischievous purposes.

Switzerland has implemented laws and a digital system that allows you to verify your age only using a new eID, while promising that it'll be untraceable that your ID was used to make this check and not giving out more info than "yes, this person is 18+". The eID is meant to be optional, but we know how these things usually go.

Whether you trust the promises to be actually implemented correctly and without errors is a different matter. I think it was supposed to be released as open source, but you can't confirm any specific build is actually running on the servers.

So I'd say it's possible and - compared to current "scan your ID" approaches - more privacy protecting. Its implementation is a different matter.

https://www.admin.ch/en/e-id-act