The Guardian dutifully reports the inevitable:
Proof-of-age ID leaked in Discord data breach
Video game chat platform Discord has suffered a data breach, informing users that their personal information – including identity documents of those required to prove their age – were compromised.
The company stated last week that an unauthorised party had compromised one of Discord’s third-party customer service providers, leading to the access of “a limited number of users” who had been in contact with the customer service or trust and safety teams.
The data compromised may have included usernames, email, billing information, the last four digits of credit card numbers, IP addresses and messages with customer support.
Discord said the alleged attacker “also gained access to a small number of government ID images (eg driving licence, passport) from users who had appealed an age determination.
[…]
Discord began using facial age assurance to check the age for users in the UK and Australia earlier this year. The company said facial images and ID images “are deleted directly after” ages are confirmed, but Discord’s website noted that if verification fails, users can contact the trust and safety team for a manual review.
Under the under 16s social media ban to come into effect on 10 December, the Australian government has outlined that it expects platforms such as Discord – which is one of the platforms that has been asked to assess if it is required to comply – should have multiple options for assessing a user’s age, and a way for them to quickly appeal an adverse decision.
Platforms can ask for ID documents as part of the age assurance scheme, but it cannot be the sole method of age assurance offered by the platforms under the policy.
In other words, the reason why users from the UK and Australia have been affected in particular is because the UK’s Online Safety Act and Australia’s upcoming ban on under-16s using social media oblige users in those countries to verify their age by giving identifying information to social media companies. The first means of age verification is facial recognition software, but if that doesn’t work, as it frequently doesn’t, the user must give the social media company identifying information such as their username, their email address, their billing information, the last four digits of their credit card number, etc. Which then gets stolen. This procedure is called “keeping people safe online”.
Yes indeed.
I believe this is an example of Elon Musk’s rule “the most ironic outcome is the most likely.”
Of course the proposed Digital ID system would not attract any hackers or other miscreants…
Governments don’t care if your identity is stolen – they can fine those companies.
I knew this would happen. I, sort of, use Discord because you have to to access Nightcafe (AI art) and the weird thing is Nightcafe is a pearl-clutching Maiden Aunt. It recently put me on the “naughty-step” for three days (via an email in red text on black) for trying to produce the kind of images you might see in The Vatican. Seriously. As far as nudity goes, sites like Nightcafe (which is kinda platformed on Discord) already self-regulates in a way Mary Whitehouse would have thought ludicrously puritanical. The whole idea that this is “for the children” is absurd. It is for arbitary government regulation for the sheer Hell of it.
It really annoys me. NC already has a NSFW setting which bans under-18s from seeing the sort of images displayed to anyone visiting, say, The National Gallery. If there is any excuse, beyond pure censorship, it is that our “betters” simply do not understand how any of how this actually works. Which, really, is no excuse.
I have a low level Pro subscription to NC. It costs me 8 USD p/m (+ UK VAT despite NC being based in Queensland, Australia???).
I did though manage to produce a “Pride” image of a (hips-up, side-breast, NO NIPPLES) nude (side-on image) of a black woman and a white woman kissing in a sensous embrace in front of a stylised rainbow flag background. That was not just OK. If memory serves I won credits for being in the top 10% (or 20% – I forget exactly) for the Daily Challenge a bit back.
Yes, I have tried to push boundaries in assorted ways on NC. Not to make porn (God knows there is enough of that already!) but, I guess, because the nude is an eternal fundamental of art since forever.
DJ,
Not just my first thought but the first thought of people I know who think a Zoom call is magic!
We’re at an intersectional time, in which people still cling to an outmoded idea about internet anonymity.
There is no such thing.
If you accept this and act accordingly, you will be happier, and you will be less likely to have the State come for you.
Maybe they thought the cherubs were child porn?
My shocked face…..
Dan, they weren’t “cherubs” but adults and if they were cherubs I’d be typing this on a cell phone (in every sense).