I say this again and again in various places - something wise needs to be done about children and the internet.
Previous interventions have failed miserably.
I think the solution is giving parents maximum power: create an immutable record of browsing history - down to the request/response; and, if desired, white listing at ISP account level.
I’ve had to deal with a child seeking out toxic materials - although fortunately not the kind discussed here.
Conventional blocking software fails because the worst parts aren’t bad domains but mixed domains - Reddit, for example.
If you’re going to enact laws, enact laws that require mixed domains to not frustrate blocking software - Reddit does this. If it detects a blocker it throws up a fake subreddit, so you have no idea what your kid tried to access.
Messaging is fairly easy to manage - delete the messaging apps. Also the immutability and white listing would do great things there too.
But when the domain spitting out toxic content is Google Classroom - there’s nothing you can do.
I don’t want to dig on this too hard, but safe harbor rules probably shouldn’t apply when the content comes from or to minors.
The idea behind safe harbor is to effectively route lawsuits to the person who created the content, not to the platform hosting it. But if it’s routing legal liability to a minor who cannot be sued - that doesn’t seem effective.
Also consumer protection laws that require companies that offer child protection features to have some kind of liability if they are merely performative. Many companies will stop offering, which is fine, because a failing system is far worse than no system.
One thing I've seen discussed that throws a wrinkle in all of this is the question of whether or not a parent can have control over what their kid can see when they're at a friend's house, and if the answer is no, does that mean something more global like mandatory age verification is necessary to ensure they are still protected.
The argument I've seen goes that even if a parent has complete control over what is available on their home network and on their children's devices, the fact that another parent in their children's friend group does not enforce the same means in practice the amount of control a parent can exert on this problem is effectively zero and a higher-level approach to eradicate this loophole is necessary.
I don't think I agree with that, but that's the strongest case I've come across for implementing such policies.
What I think it really calls for though is a solution in the space of community and communication rather than direct governmental intervention.
I think that war with Russia is approaching and they know that Putin will do something; thus while it's done under the oretense of saving the children, it's for wartime...
Right. Russia has been grinding for 50km in eastern Ukraine for 4 years, and now suddenly it wants to attack an alliance 7x its population and 20x its economy. It sounds like yet another excuse to erode liberty than an actual threat to the west.
Previous interventions have failed miserably.
I think the solution is giving parents maximum power: create an immutable record of browsing history - down to the request/response; and, if desired, white listing at ISP account level.
I’ve had to deal with a child seeking out toxic materials - although fortunately not the kind discussed here.
Conventional blocking software fails because the worst parts aren’t bad domains but mixed domains - Reddit, for example.
If you’re going to enact laws, enact laws that require mixed domains to not frustrate blocking software - Reddit does this. If it detects a blocker it throws up a fake subreddit, so you have no idea what your kid tried to access.
Messaging is fairly easy to manage - delete the messaging apps. Also the immutability and white listing would do great things there too.
But when the domain spitting out toxic content is Google Classroom - there’s nothing you can do.
I don’t want to dig on this too hard, but safe harbor rules probably shouldn’t apply when the content comes from or to minors.
The idea behind safe harbor is to effectively route lawsuits to the person who created the content, not to the platform hosting it. But if it’s routing legal liability to a minor who cannot be sued - that doesn’t seem effective.
Also consumer protection laws that require companies that offer child protection features to have some kind of liability if they are merely performative. Many companies will stop offering, which is fine, because a failing system is far worse than no system.
The argument I've seen goes that even if a parent has complete control over what is available on their home network and on their children's devices, the fact that another parent in their children's friend group does not enforce the same means in practice the amount of control a parent can exert on this problem is effectively zero and a higher-level approach to eradicate this loophole is necessary.
I don't think I agree with that, but that's the strongest case I've come across for implementing such policies.
What I think it really calls for though is a solution in the space of community and communication rather than direct governmental intervention.