Discord Begins Testing Facial Recognition Scans For Age Verification 21
Discord has begun testing age verification via facial scans or ID uploads for users in the UK and Australia seeking access to sensitive content. "The chat app's new process has been described as an 'experiment,' and comes in response to laws passed in those countries that place guardrails on youth access to online platforms," reports Gizmodo. From the report: Users may be asked to verify their age when encountering content that has been flagged by Discord's systems as being sensitive in nature, or when they change their settings to enable access to sensitive content. The app will ask users to scan their face through a computer or smartphone webcam; alternatively, they can scan a driver's license or other form of ID. "We're currently running tests in select regions to age-gate access to certain spaces or user settings," a spokesperson for Discord said in a statement. "The information shared to power the age verification method is only used for the one-time age verification process and is not stored by Discord or our vendor. For Face Scan, the solution our vendor uses operates on-device, which means there is no collection of any biometric information when you scan your face. For ID verification, the scan of your ID is deleted upon verification."
Good thing (Score:3)
any kid by now knows to create online accounts as 18+ from the start.
Re: (Score:2)
Scanning IDs should be illegal. (Score:5, Insightful)
A photo ID should only be valid when presented in person, FBI-style, right next to a person matching the document. Just because someone has a photocopy of an ID card doesn't mean a thing online and this kind of age verification is going to end up with million of adult ID documents being illegally copied and passed around by their children.
Re: (Score:2)
If Discord insist on this I'll close mine down and delete my account. Sorry, but no, a photo of my face is a step too far.
Not storing data? (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Yea right. How are they going to prove they verified the age, whose photo was scanned etc? If they are telling the truth for right now, that will quickly change the first time a government will try to fine them for failing to verify age, which will happen the first time some underage user does something bad that blows up in the media, and then someone points the finger at social media.
I did cybersecurity audit / compliance work for a Big 4 audit firm and the answer to your question is that the kind of controls fraud you're describing is pretty easy to spot and pretty difficult to hide.
Like yeah from a technical perspective faking all that stuff is possible, but doing it in a non-obvious way, having everyone cover their tracks and getting their internal compliance people to go along with it? Not going to happen.
I'm not defending these age verification laws btw, I'm just commenting tha
Re: (Score:2)
the scan of your ID is deleted upon verification
Who cares if they delete the original upload if they keep all the metadata they extracted from it. Read the TOS of sites that use these types of services. None of them make the legal claim that only the yes/no result is kept. And they can't because they need more data than that to do fraud and abuse investigates.
Plus this seems to be a phone based system so the vendor can sell the fact that you used their id system to verify with Discord to data miners who'll combine it with all the other data extracted
Re: Not storing data? (Score:2)
One ID to rule them all (Score:2)
What prevents one or a handful of IDs from being used by millions of people?
An obvious solution for that problem would be for every ID verification to be cross-checked against governmental registries.
This is also very convenient for the government to 'protect the children' and 'fight terrorists' by knowing every 'sensitive' thing that your ID has been registered to have had accessed. Your personal liberty will certainly be secured by this enlightened system, and no dragnet will ever ruin your reputation and
Photo-ID verification that could actually work (Score:1)
Use a notary public or similar legally-regulated person to actually do the verification in-person. The notary gives you a digitally signed proof of identity that's good for a few days and/or is only good for a particular purpose, such as identifying yourself to a specific gaming company, online bank, or other merchant (likely the merchant that will cover the notary's fee). Think of it as an in-person-verified web certificate that's only good for a week or only good for one purpose.
Sure, you COULD spread t
Nope... (Score:2)
We use Discord for our D&D club (we're spread out), I can't see any of us being willing to give up that kind of information/privacy for Discord, we'll just use something else.
Any NSFW channels? (Score:2)
Does your D&D club's server have any channels that are marked as "age-restricted" (formerly called "not safe for work")? If not, your server's members outside Australia are less likely to experience the effect of this experiment.
Re: (Score:2)
But if you forget to flag the channel as NSFW and Pete posts some disturbing picture, you'll all be locked out until you comply
First they wanted your phone number... (Score:2)
I'm fine (Score:2)
https://knowyourmeme.com/photo... [knowyourmeme.com]
In other news... (Score:2)
Clearview AI announces investment in Discord. They will become shareholders in return for access to corporate intellectual property.
Face Filters will Bypass the Security (Score:1)
Trivial (Score:2)
Isn't this trivial to bypass with a simple webcam filter that makes you look older?
Sounds like a fun exercise to try to bypass.