We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
|
Samizdata quote of the day – VPNs now a Red Flag as Age-Check Lobby cracks down on privacy A trade group representing companies that build age verification systems is now lobbying to extend these checks to anyone using a VPN in the UK. The Age Verification Providers Association (AVPA) wants online platforms that fall under the UK’s censorship law, the Online Safety Act, to not only detect VPN usage but also analyze user behavior to guess whether someone might be a minor in disguise.
If flagged, users would face a prompt: prove your age, or allow a one-time geolocation to confirm you’re outside the UK.
According to the AVPA, this process is necessary because VPNs can mask users’ actual locations, allowing them to appear as though they are in countries where age verification laws do not apply. The association points to data showing a dramatic increase in VPN use around the time the UK’s new internet rules were enforced, suggesting people are using these tools to bypass restrictions.
This approach treats privacy tools as a form of defiance. Here, VPNs, once considered sensible and essential for online security, are being rebranded as suspicious.
– Richard Eldred
|
Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
|
No one was really concerned that kiddies were viewing smut until it became clear that this was the camel’s nose that could wipe out internet anonymity.
Well, stap me vitals! Trade group wants thing its members do made mandatory. Who’d ever have thunk?
“People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.”
―Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.
lobbying to extend these checks to anyone using a VPN in the UK…. If flagged, users would face a prompt: prove your age, or allow a one-time geolocation to confirm you’re outside the UK.
That doesn’t make any sense. If the check is for anyone using a VPN in the UK then they have to already know you are in the UK. And if they know that why do they need to geolocate you?
Which is to say that the only way this is possible is to demand that the VPN providers geolocate every user in the world, and, if UK is the determined location, perform the UK specialized checks.
Not only will VPN providers not in a million years do that — disguise of geolocation is one of their key selling points — but it is an EXTREMELY harmful thing — meaning that oppressive regimes like China could know who the users are, deeply undermining the right to protest and organize against oppressive regimes.
No VPN provider will do that, so they are effectively demanding a ban on VPNs within the UK (like wot I predicted — and for my next trick I predict that this evening the sun will set in the west — you’re welcome…)
But the worst thing is the horrific evil of these age check companies, trying to make a few pennies by destroying the internet that gives them life and breath, and making a buck off the back of the brave men and women who use these tools to stand up against the world’s worst tyrants.
Of course Britain is the right place to do that since it is quickly heading to the top of the heap of most oppressive governments in the world. It isn’t there yet, but hold Keir’s beer; he has another four years to go.
You guys aren’t going to vote your way out of this, are you?
Yes bobby b – “the children” and “porn” are excuses, the agenda has always been to end privacy (hence the attack on VPNs) and to push censorship and persecution – and this is an international agenda, NOT just a British matter.
Eyrie – there will be no General Election till 2029, and even if people who say they support Freedom of Speech win that election – how much power do elected people have in Britain? The real power seems to be in the hands of officials and “experts” – “academic advisers to the government” and-so-on.
This is very much an international agenda (an agenda of the state controlling information and opinion and the state itself being controlled by officials and “experts”) – but the British system of governance seems to be further down this path than most other nations.
Sam Duncan and Fraser Orr – sadly so Gentleman, tragically so.
The Online Safety Act does not censor anything – adults can legally continue to see everything they saw before it came into force. Indeed, Section 22 of the Act creates a new duty on platforms to protect free speech – a First Amendment for the UK.
We recommend the use of good quality VPNs (but take care which you use, many log your every move)
No-one is asking VPNs to check your location. Obligations rest with the user-to-user platforms and adult websites – they need to challenge users whose location they cannot know due to the use of a VPN to prove they are in a jurisdiction where age checks are not required, or they can alternatively just prove their age. In the USA, it is quite normal to prove your location before you can bet online given the different laws in each state.
Are you having a laugh? Have you been asleep the last few years?
… who are quite rightly telling the UK to get stuffed.
The early results that I saw – with non-porn content denied to searchers, replaced with a message about verification – sort of puts the lie to this.
It all has that tone of “if you have nothing to hide, it’s all good.”
I have nothing to hide from decent freedom-loving people.
I no longer include the UK government in that category. I will hide my identity from people such as them or I will not participate in places they watch.
Police your own kids if you must. Leave me out of it.
Paul Marks – that was my point.
In case some of you missed it (though perhaps it was obvious from his ridiculous comments) Iain Corby is an Executive Director of the Age Verification Providers Association. If you click his name on his comment it’ll take you right there, so in fairness to him his isn’t hiding this fact, and I’m not doxing him by saying this.
Apparently they have the troops out to defend this horrendous piece of legislation, even deigning to visit this dark corner of the web. I’m afraid the fact that his association’s members are getting rich off this Orwellian legislation might just put a tiny dent in his credibility and objectivity.
Perhaps since we have Iain’s ear he can offer some justification for Ofcom’s threat to fine 4chan, an American company that has no assets whatsoever in the UK?
Now, I’m not saying there are aren’t fair(ish) players in the Age Verification Protection Racket but the last one I came across wanted a credit card number. Obviously with no malicious intent, obviously… The best that can be said of these C21st McAfees’s is simply that they are a protection racket, the worst that they are criminals with government backing.
Iain Corby – what you say is not in line with objective reality, the censorship is happening.
Once again, the hash (or whatever) that assigns avatars proves its perceptiveness, this time by giving the guy posting in defense of the censors an avatar with a bandage over its mouth.
Turns out, Samizdata.net was a leader in Artificial Intelligence all along.
And it’s given CayleyGraph a bit of a TOR network diagram…