I think the text is somewhat dubious in its arguments, but this (and the arguments built on this assertion) is just plain wrong:

[Signals servers have] a few important pieces of data;

Message dates and times Message senders and recipients (via phone number identifiers)

Signal clients implement the Pond protocol. As a result, Signals servers know who a message is for (obviously, how else do you get the message) but cannot know who it is FROM.

I’ve been playing around with implementing a secure/private messenger demo for myself, and have been consistently impressed with how privacy preserving Signal is when reading their papers and code. I wish it was selfhostable, but apart from that, it’s great.

The server would be NICE to be OSS, but ultimately, privacy breaches are prevented client/protocol side.

I don’t really know, sorry :(

If you want to migrate, is going conduit - conduwuit - continuwuity (first version) - continuwuity (current version) maybe an option?

I went with continuwuity and am happy with it. Development happens at a steady pace, with sane priorities. The server is stable and I haven’t had any issues to speak of, despite one minor bug that got resolved very quickly after creating an issue.

This doesn’t make a call to government servers.

The app (or desktop application BTW, incl. Linux) reads your national ID’s NFC tag, once. When you need to prove your age, the app locally computes a zkp that only tells the site “at least 18yo yes/no”.

Note that every EU country has a form of national ID, and the digital capabilities of these IDs are already used for a bunch of stuff (e.g. taxes, bank account creation,…). This doesn’t worsen the privacy situation for EU citizens, but instead ensures that no privacy-unfriendly solutions emerge.

This is the one true answer.

Just an IP, nothing else. And easily curlable.

It always feels like YouTube is double dipping though. Not with what the post is about; that’s either/or, obviously.

But Google makes a nice profit collecting user data and behavior, and then selling that to advertising companies. That happens regardless of using an adblocker, and I’d be shocked if it doesn’t also happen regardless of YT premium.

But at the same time, Google also IS an advertising company; they use their user data collection platform to also show ads to users, getting paid again.

So personally, even if YT wasn’t owned and operated by a shitstain of a capitalist eldritch horror company, I’d still have zero qualms blocking all their ads: they’re making money off of me regardless.

Yeah, not having ads in the phone app, the TV app, the music app on the phone or in the browser is really nice, I love it. Also got that for all my friends and family.

Never paid YouTube a dime though :)

Tale your AI shit out of here

That’s a really well argued paragraph. But have you considered: why pet shaped if not for petting?

(Jokes aside though. Point taken. But there’s nothing you can say to keep me from talking to them in baby talk from now on when I’m out gardening amongst them. Who’s a big stripey boy? Yes you are, aren’t you? :))

Wait I can PET BUMBLEBEES?!

That actually makes a lot of sense, ha.

(Just in case you aren’t familiar with the Culture: yep, anyone or anything in it would be famtastic.)

Fuck, Id be okay with any random Culture citizen

Not arguing that. Of course there’s worse things.

But you must also acknowledge that it’s trivial to make this a non-issue. For example, I’ve seen lots of places where the door opens outwards with a kick. Or, even better (if slightly less space efficient) just have no door at all, and instead a short entrance with two 90 degree turns.

I think this is something that more and more places do anyways, basically any modern-ish place I’ve been to in recent years do the no-door-thing.

So? Like a their to half of people (sorry don’t remember the stat, just remember being shocked how high it was) do not wash their hands after using the toilet.

Why would I want to touch that doorhandle.

Did they still not release the actual torrents though?

And why would they implement it in a somewhat private manner if it could be implemented in a privacy-infringing manner?

I honestly don’t think most democratic governments have an interest in making this privacy-infringing. Lobbyists/companies on the other hand… But all the more reason to write legislation that ensures age verification must be handled like this.

That already tells the government that I’m accessing porn because why else would I need to confirm I’m an adult online?

Cinema rickets for FSK18 movie? Ordering alcohol? Gambling? Renting a car?

Basically anything you’re only allowed to do as an adult.

But that’s kind of why I mentioned, it’s just one rough draft for such a protocol.

It should be Dot Dot! But it’s Dot Dot Dot! - sanest Bitchard moment

It’s mostly just that I don’t want the government to know precisely which websites I visit. Nor do I want the the porn sites to know exactly who I am.

I understand, I want that too. It’s easily possible though (just one example for a scheme):

• you visit porn site
• porn site sends your browser a random nonce
• you/browser tell government service: sign this if I’m >18
• government signs the nonce + a timstamp to prove freshness
• your browser forwards the result to the porn site
• porn site can verify signature per standard public certificate chains
• now porn site has proof that you are >18, but knows nothing else about you; and government only knows that you wanted proof that you are an adult, but not for what site or purpose you wanted to prove that

Alternatively, if we go the “device has an age bracket field browsers access” route, it’s even simpler, and just as if not more privacy preserving.

In that case: sorry to blow up on you. I have seen to many comments on here claiming these things while being 100% serious. I just saw your comment and incidentally had time to write the above for once, so, here we are.

I agree that there’s no way to completely cut teens off from porn. Your torrent example is perfectly demonstrating this.

But I also do not understand the current outrage at anything trying to improve the situation, even when it’s not some stupid “scan your face” scheme.

I’d also like to think so. In this case though, this was clearly not what was intended, and also involved a lot of porn.