Apparently this will include Linux…
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So define Operating System. Are embedded systems Operating Systems? Coz that’s going to cast a rather wide net.
Selective enforcement. Basically if they want to do shit to you they will prosecute you, otherwise they won’t bother.
I can’t wait for my microwave to ask me to take off my glasses, face the camera, and turn my head slowly from left to right.
Gavin Newsom is such a fucking tool.
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Doesn’t even make sense. Virtually all Linux distros can function completely offline. How do you do age verification completely offline? Classic politician who doesn’t understand tech trying to look like they’re doing something to save the kids.
They will make it a crime to not have any OS that is not compliant, that simple.
The only platforms for now where this might work are Windows, macOS, iOS, and stock Android, however as Muta hypothesized, if this extends to hardware-level, a law could just mandate SecureBoot and lock out the ability to implement custom keys, and then only allow a short list of state-approved OSes to boot on the hardware, which no doubt Windows would be on that short list.
Similarly, all non-Apple mobile devices as an extension to that could be locked exclusively to stock Android, eliminating custom ROMs like LineageOS or GrapheneOS as an option entirely, let alone mobile Linux distros.
Me, buying cellphone parts from another state to assemble myself like an 80% lower to avoid having to drink a Verification Can every time somebody calls me:
I think I just invented the concept of a “ghost phone”
Me, using 8 bit adders to make my own CPU because everything else is now locked down to all hell
That seems as reasonable as suggesting they could pass a law requiring everyone to hire a govt licensed computer user in order to interact with their devices, and otherwise touching a keyboard or touchscreen would be illegal.
It doesn’t feel like a realistic estimation of what they would actually try to do. There’s too much that is currently dependent on Linux, you’d do better to just dismantle and ban the internet.
Another thing that could hypothetically be done given NK does this already so there’s precedent as far as this goes, is any given government could make their own Red Star OS equivalent, and then have that as the only state-approved distro
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You think they’ll pass up the chance to enforce an increase in mass surveillance?
Define “Operating System”…
I guess my washing machine & car are also going to be “not for use in California.”
Those Cisco switches & Broadcom DSLAMs would be tricky too … I guess the internet’s “not for use in California.”
And the air-gapped power station control system? “not for use in California.”
It is annoying that these laws come in (I’m also including magical thinking about encryprion backdoors for “the good guys”) without any form of real-world, practical assessment. Complete waste of tax payers money and undue stress for everyone.
FFS.
Imagine you’re not allowed to use your washing machine if you’re under 18.
It will get repealed when all the always-working parents can’t stand “teenager smell.”
Linux distributions should react by asking users to confirm they’re not in California. They’ll backpedal fast.
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Linux is the most widely used OS in the world, if you include servers.
If servers’ OSes can’t be legally used in California anymore, that would be funny.
How about don’t implement it and when California realises they need computers then they might change their mind?
They will make exceptions for themselves. Like how none of the laws passed in the UK apply to the military, politicians, and police. Even for their own personal use.
I’ll just copy my comment from a similar bill in colorado, I will leave the link to the colorado bill in, but here is the california bill as well if you want to read it yourself.
The title is very misleading. This is the actual bill that they are trying to pass. The link already includes a summary, so I will just give you an even simpler explanation and some practical examples why this is actually really neat.
First of all, this is not age verification. No IDs have to be submitted, no selfies or videos will be submitted to any age estimation AIs, so put your pitchforks away (for now, until they decide to expand the bill to include these measures as well, then it’s time to burn it down). The name of the bill already tells you what it is: Age Attestation. Aka what every piece of software already does before it shows you explicit content.
With the bill in place, every “operating system provider” has to ask you for your age or date of birth during OS setup, which will then be made available to other software via an API. So instead of having to fill in your date of birth or checking “Are you 18+/21+?” boxes, software will use the new API to check instead, saving you the trouble of doing it manually every time for every application that is not made for all ages.
What makes it even better is that the OS does not have to provide your actual age or birth date, the bill has a minimum requirement of just disclosing age-bracket data. So it could work just like age ratings, which also rely on age groups rather than specific years. Also, the bill explicitly forbids asking for more than your age, sharing more than that via the new API and using the entered age data for anything else than the described purpose, like sending it to a server for tracking purposes.
And finally, as mentioned in the beginning, no IDs or anything else as it is with age verification necessary. You can still lie, just enter 1.1.2000 or whatever you want. Nothing changes, except that you will only have to do it once every time you reinstall/reset your OS or buy a new device.
This bill makes the operating system provider the responsible party. They have to implement this, and ensure compliance. Failure is a $2000 fine every time a child launches an application.
Under this law, Microsoft and Google are charged with implementing this feature and ensuring compliance. They are, obviously, “OS Providers”. They control their respective operating systems.
With FOSS OSes, Ubuntu isn’t the OS provider. Arch isn’t the OS provider. Debian, Redhat, Gentoo aren’t the OS Providers. The product each of these entities provide is an OS, but it is an OS that is under your full and total control. Not theirs. They cannot control what you do with the OS. They cannot ensure your implementation is compliant with state, local, national, or international law. Under this law they are not the responsible party.
Under this law. You are the “OS Provider”.
What about distros that don’t use automated account creation (or have optional automation), like Arch for example or Gentoo? The law isn’t made to accommodate those people:
“Provide an accessible interface at account setup that requires an account holder to indicate the birth date, age, or both, of the user of that device for the purpose of providing a signal regarding the user’s age bracket to applications available in a covered application store.”
The odd thing is the wording that it “requires” an account holder to indicate age or DOB. As with anything *nix, there is always a workaround. There is no way to require anything of the user. There’s also no definition for “accessible interface.”
And what about all the operating systems that already exist and are no longer maintained? Who is responsible for that. Microslop gotta update Win95 to add age verification?
I use DosBox to play MS-DOS games that I played as a kid, those didn’t ask you to enter any credentials whatsoever. I guess they’re illegal now.
hey, Leisure Suit Larry had a really tough 3-part questionaire to seperate adults from minors.
Omg… You would have to verify every single VM. Would docker images count or not? Might be enough to push me to properly work out how to use that instead of VMs…
Fucking stupid. What now, everyone adds a script to enter 04/01/1984 for every continuous integration pipeline? Every kubernetes cluster has to include an age automation? Idiot politicians should not draft policies about shit they have no clue about.
Politician: The lowest form of life on earth (lower than slime mold… sorry for insulting slime mold).
They produce nothing of value, never have and never will, true sociopaths, total liars, elitest narsacistc parasites and oxygen wasters and generally evil…
It’s because they are controlled by capitalists. Capitalists have shown the whole world what they stand for these past 4 years.
Yeah I agree with the article, people will just say “Do not use in California” then…F off. OSes are VERY different all over the place.
I dont see this as enforceable. Linux in itself is multi-user. Everyone is just going to put some bogus year for age and continue on. I also dont see websites caving and adding it all in because that would cost a metric ton and be inconvenient for everyone involved. What about server OSes? OSes that have a machine as the only user. Or embedded devices?
It also does NOT protect Children in any way.
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of all the shit out there, that’s what needed attention?!
Gavin Gruesome at it again
Sorry but I don’t think the article text backs up the title?
The claim is that they have to enforce age verification, but the quoted law says:
Provide an accessible interface at account setup that requires an account holder to indicate the birth date, age, or both, of the user of that device for the purpose of providing a signal regarding the user’s age bracket to applications available in a covered application store.
Doesn’t this just mean it needs to ask for an age at setup, so e.g. parents can set it up with an age and they can automatically be restricted?
I don’t see anywhere actual verification is required, if you’re setting it up yourself then just lie?
Honestly, this sounds like my preferred path if we are gonna do anything.
I agree. This doesn’t seem any more egregious than clicking a button on a website that says “I am over 18”.
Which website is that?
The one with naked people on it.
Do you have the slightest idea how little that narrows it down?
Wait, there is more than one?
Mr. Powers, everybody says that nudity and cursing aren’t Internet-safe. How much poem could there possibly be?
But also, every FreeDos install ,server, managed network switch, IoT device, gas pump, etc. now needs to verify user age.
Also, it has to make “reasonable” effort to verify the age. Maybe just asking your age isn’t considered reasonable by the state. Since the law doesn’t lay out what to do, anything you do might become unreasonable depending on the winds of the day.
Nah it seems it doesn’t apply to physical devices (except general computing devices as mentioned elsewhere)
(f) This title does not apply to any of the following:
(1) A broadband internet access service, as defined in Section 3100.
(2) A telecommunications service, as defined in Section 153 of Title 47 of the United States Code.
(3) The delivery or use of a physical product.
(3) seems to imply the OS that runs your switch or gas pump isn’t included. But I see nothing in the law that clarifies servers or any CLI only interface, or even any OS that doesn’t have accounts.
Where do you quote “reasonable” from? The only part of the law with that word is referring to a different, already existing law (or the bit about reasonable technical limitations causing the wrong signals sent in the API).
You’re right that mostly the reasonable thing was related to previous law.
Is a mobile phone not a “physical device”? An operating system always has to run on physical hardware, so does this just invalidate the entire thing?
Nah I don’t think it does. You don’t really get that because the intent of a law is important in court cases.
Mobile phones are specifically covered:
(g) “Operating system provider” means a person or entity that develops, licenses, or controls the operating system software on a computer, mobile device, or any other general purpose computing device.
I’m just not sure. It seems contradictory to me, since the manufacturer of a physical device is also “a person or entity that controls the operating system”. Unless they sell the hardware with no OS installed? This exemption doesn’t seem to mean anything.
With how they’ve defined “App Store”, basically any product that can download applications is affected by this, including devices that don’t even have the concept of a user account. I’m a little unclear still on what’s required of an entirely offline OS.
I am not sure what’s required of a bare bones Linux install (general computing device) that has access to a package manager (application store)!
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TBH this sounds to me like something specifically intended to not be an Australian-like solution, which they could have copied.
But why do they assume that I am going to create an account to simply use an OS?
Ok I did it, I read the full text of the law, and you’re right.
The existence of Linux or anything not big tech and the broad range of options within seems to be ignored. Does a CLI only OS need to provide a GUI for its “accessible interface”?
On a different note, I did see the last point here:
(f) This title does not apply to any of the following:
(1) A broadband internet access service, as defined in Section 3100.
(2) A telecommunications service, as defined in Section 153 of Title 47 of the United States Code.
(3) The delivery or use of a physical product.
(3) seems to imply the OS that runs your microwave isn’t included.
I am also using my phone with no account linked to it, as it is not required. It still seems to be an ignored usecase, even with the added context you provided.
Yeah perhaps. Or that “account” doesn’t really need to bw what we think of as an account.
Could it be covered, but they would still have to ask? It says if it wasn’t done at setup it has to ask, so perhaps an account-less OS would still be expected to ask for an age and provide it when asked?
