Weekly Update 480

Good morning. I got a lot of content today. A lot of content

today. A lot of content about those pesky kids and the government getting all up in your things.

Before that, just while I'm waiting for people to drop in, I uh I'm troubleshooting Shellies. Now, for those

troubleshooting Shellies. Now, for those of you that listen to this for a bit, you're aware that Shellies are IoT relays. There's little devices that sit

relays. There's little devices that sit behind the power switches of your wall.

Power switches, light switches can do power switches as well, but mostly for our house. Light switches.

Got I think 102 Shellies. Is that the final count? 102 Shellies in the house.

final count? 102 Shellies in the house.

102. And uh the whole point of these shellies is that they add automation to otherwise dumb switches. So switches

still work like they normally should, but the automation as well so that we can turn on scenes and things like that.

Uh, get debits first in.

Congratulations.

And for the most part, they work really nice and the house lights up at the right time and goes dark at the right time and it's beautiful. And then for

some reason, of the 102, like 40 of them stopped being addressable over HTTP

yesterday. And I I don't know why. Um,

yesterday. And I I don't know why. Um,

now I say address HTTP. I can't ping a bunch of them either. I'm just having like just weird erratic behavior and I've always said this that to some extent and I've got massive amounts of

Wi-Fi coverage here. Thank you,

Ubiquity.

So, I don't think it's that. But then

it's like uh okay, are they in the IoT network which has got 5G disabled and it's all 2.4G and then what about radio strengths and you go down this like massive rabbit hole of just screwy

screwy network configuration things.

Anyh who, point is discovered that one way of approaching this which I thought was going to be easy and now I'm down the AI rabbit hole is I just take

all of this and I dump it in a chat GPT and go, "Hey, here's my problem. This is

what I'm seeing. Help me troubleshoot it, which in some ways is really good because I can take like I've got a a list literally in an Excel document of all the shellies and the rooms they're in and all the IP addresses. That's

fine. And then I've got a little app that enumerates through everything and it can do things like update where firmware updates are available, you know, report the status on, off, how

dim. Uh, and then of course I've got the

dim. Uh, and then of course I've got the entire bit around uh the UniFi network.

And the UniFi network can show all of the devices which access point they're connected to, uh, signal strength, this sort of thing. And I figure that for 102

devices, if I just dump all of that into Chat GPT, it'll figure it out.

But in classic AI style, it's like, "Okay, go through this and do this and then do this and then do that, and then I I'll go I'll go, "Hang on a second.

That thing doesn't even exist." And I'll send a screen grab. And the AI always comes back and goes, "You're absolutely right." Well, why didn't you tell me

right." Well, why didn't you tell me that? Like, if you knew that, why did

that? Like, if you knew that, why did you tell me that in the first place? So,

just before I went and got my coffee, uh, last thing I tried doing was dumping all that data in here. And now it's like,

uh, all right, with these unified screenshots, we can now finally correlate activ or connectivity failures versus AP association and see whether we're chasing systemic failures or a bunch of individual devices. Okay, can

you just get me to the what's the conclusion? Like just just tell me the

conclusion? Like just just tell me the one thing to do to fix it all. Uh

recalls hypothesis high confidence the IoT LAN is because it's all on an IoT VLAN as well. Uh allow devices report

quick fix checklist.

Uh you you likely have something like this block IO2 to IoT which is like then client isol. I'll deal with that later.

client isol. I'll deal with that later.

It's painful.

The thing that's most and on top of this at the moment because this all started because I've got or had up until a day ago when now I've screwed everything. I

had one Shelly out of 102 that was consistently misbehaving and I was like maybe it's just like in a spot in the wall cavity where it's not getting good

signal. So yeah, power that down. Pull.

signal. So yeah, power that down. Pull.

You're meant to be a licensed electrician. Uh okay. Okay, let's let's

electrician. Uh okay. Okay, let's let's just imagine that I haven't actually changed anything.

All I've done is improved the Wi-Fi signal. Anyway, my hope was that it was

signal. Anyway, my hope was that it was just going to be one Shelly and I just I would just get a licensed electrician to

change that one Shelly, but uh yeah, since I started messing around with stuff, now it's 40 Sh. I don't

know. It's painful.

Good, George. Mar Karen, thanks for joining everybody.

Let's get on to the um the thing that's a little bit different to the normal data breach stuff, but I think it's in the same realm. It's cyber.

Everything's cyber now one way or another.

And maybe I should have seen this coming, but it was it was actually quite exciting when I got up yesterday morning. And I was like, "Wow." I like I

morning. And I was like, "Wow." I like I checked my my tweets on X and uh and they scrolled off the screen multiple times like, "Wow, I thought X

was pretty much dead because everybody doesn't like Elon and then voted with their feet and then just disappeared and got offline and did real life stuff, which is very topical what we're about

to talk about."

But there was just reams and reams and reams of messages in response to something that I posted I thought was very very simple. Uh and it was exciting

to see it was like the Twitter of old.

People were irrational and abusive and it was fantastic to experience all that again. So

again. So I quite enjoyed going through that and I think it it actually raises many different issues which I addressed a bunch of them. I wasted way too much time yesterday between the freaking

Shellies and this. Way too much time engaging in stuff that just scratched an itch.

Let's start with the tweet.

My 13-year-old daughter Al, she's she's been on live stream before, but we've done things like presentations on stage before. We have consciously decided that

before. We have consciously decided that she's going to have a degree of publicity from earlier on in life by virtue of of what I do and what she's interested in as well. Anywh who, uh she

turned 13 around the middle of the year. Now,

many of her friends have been given access to social media, namely Tik Tok and Snapchat seem to be the two biggies for this demographic over the course of

multiple years. So, when they are 10,

multiple years. So, when they are 10, 11, 12 years old and we said, my wife Charlotte and I always said, we are not going to give her access to social media

until she turns 13, which is the minimum age for the platforms. Now, there are a couple of reasons for this. One reason

is I didn't want her losing access to her account later on. And I've got a very good friend. Uh Stephan knows Adam.

Uh and Adam's got a couple of daughters who are extraordinarily intelligent, smart people. And one of them in particular had I think it was an

axle back then, Twitter account, uh before she was 13. and she built up a really interesting history doing things like aviation safety stuff like interviewing pilots who'd landed burning

airplanes and stuff like this and built this really interesting fulfilling wholesome everything about it was fantastic profile before she was meant to have the account

and then after she turned 13 she had changed the age to reflect her current age thinking that now I'm 13 it will be fine and Twitter went okay you lied

yoink everything gone. Everything gone.

And that to me has always been I cannot take that call right now. That to me has always been

a bit of the cornerstone of why I don't want the kids to have social media before 13. So we have a 16-year-old son

before 13. So we have a 16-year-old son as well and he got it on his 13th birthday. That's one of them. The other

birthday. That's one of them. The other

is regardless of where your needle is on the compass, I think we would all agree there is a point at which it is probably too young to have Snapchat and there is

a point at which you have the maturity and then we can argue where that needle should be. I thought 13 was actually

should be. I thought 13 was actually pretty reasonable and I still think it is in the case of our kids.

Now, arguably there are a lot of negative behaviors that come as a result of kids being on social media. Uh

social media. Uh let's go through a few of them because it's it relates to what's happening here in Australia.

The ones that I see with our kids, not so much your son, but our daughter in particular, they're different people.

By far and away, the single most worrying thing that I see with her is screen addiction.

Like, how many times have either you done this to your kids or or if you had internet or mobile devices whilst you're a kid, if your parents aren't to you, they're like, "Put the phone down. Put

the phone down and be in the moment.

Would you join us? What is so important that you can't be part of this moment?"

The screen addiction is the thing that follows everyone everywhere. And we

suffer from it too. I suffer from it definitely. I don't know what to do. I

definitely. I don't know what to do. I

don't have the device.

Unless I'm doing something active, then it's fine. Right. So that's number one.

it's fine. Right. So that's number one.

Uh number two, there is definitely bullying. Everybody knows this, right?

bullying. Everybody knows this, right?

Uh and again, there's there's a whole spectrum. There is, you know, I saw some

spectrum. There is, you know, I saw some stuff during the week with my daughter on Snapchat where where one of the boys was just saying dumb Yeah, like that's

the only way to put it. Just dumb

using words that he really should not be putting in writing. Remember, it always stays with you. Even if you think it's on Snapchat and it disappears, it doesn't. It's there. Someone will screen

doesn't. It's there. Someone will screen grab it. Oh, but you they tell you if

grab it. Oh, but you they tell you if you screen grab someone get another phone and then they'll take a photo.

don't do dumb online. Uh so anyway, it but it was it was minor and it passed in the course of a day. And of course at the other end of the spectrum, we get all the way to the point where kids are consistently harassed. It ruins their

consistently harassed. It ruins their lives. In some cases, they take their

lives. In some cases, they take their lives. Like it's really really serious.

lives. Like it's really really serious.

The bullying thing that has never been much of an issue for us, but I don't like the behaviors that we see there.

never to the point of saying, you know, you should there's certainly been cases where I'm like, you know what, you should just put that down for the weekend. Come back on Monday, everybody

weekend. Come back on Monday, everybody would have moved on to something else.

And then the third thing that has worried me the most is it it's it's not unhealthy body image or things like that. So, I don't see our

kids, it's not affecting like their diet or their their exercise or or things like this, but it's particularly the marketing side of it, you know, like I

look at the the stuff, our daughter in particular on when it relates to things like facial products. Look, what is all this stuff? Okay, now I'm a guy. I'm

this stuff? Okay, now I'm a guy. I'm

going to have a different opinion, say to my wife, but even she looks at it.

She's like, "The amount of stuff you're getting marketed, which is just useless crap, and then a lot of it's pushed by very famous influencers and so on, and it all looks fantastic. All of that is

just I I think unhealthy at a a very minimal amount for her, but I can see how that would extend and become a real problem

for some people." Now before I get into what's happening here in Australia, the the other caveat I'll add here is that by virtue of what I do, the kids have

grown up all their lives with me focusing on cyber security, privacy, uh being in the spotlight myself, them

being at conferences, uh them seeing lots of stuff around scams, around fishing, around all the sorts of nasty stuff that happens online. We have so many discussions about this. They live

and breathe. There's not a day that goes by where we're not having some sort of a discussion that effect. That is not how it is for most kids. Most kids are already more technically literate than

their parents by the time they turn 13.

Like there's absolutely no doubt about that. And you see that all the time.

that. And you see that all the time.

Most parents have got no idea what their kids, I would say, regardless of age, even much younger than 30, no idea what

they're doing online or how to navigate the online world with them. What I'm

saying is we're special. This is why, right? Like it's a very very different

right? Like it's a very very different household to most by virtue of my job.

Now, here's what's happening in Australia.

Last year, Australian government said there are concerns around the three things that I just discussed. Screen

time, bullying, all the marketing stuff, as well as things like grooming kids online. It's a big problem. It's a

online. It's a big problem. It's a

really, really big problem in terms of the impact on kids. Arguably, the

prevalence of grooming certainly that leads through to physical interactions or other nasty things is much less than the prevalence of the other three things I just mentioned because everyone gets those three things from day one when

you're online.

But it's one that pulls at the heartstrings. It it it is a very very

heartstrings. It it it is a very very serious problem. So government gets to

serious problem. So government gets to the point where they're like a bunch of these things are concerning.

uh we think Australian government thinks that kids should not have social media till they're 16. So we got the platforms predominantly US-based tech platform

saying 13 now the government's like 16 and the onus is going to be on the platforms to ensure that they don't let

people under 16 on those platforms. So you know if we take Snapchat because this will bring us to the point of this discussion here. it is incumbent upon

discussion here. it is incumbent upon Snapchat by the 10th of December this year. Now, again, we've had more than a

year. Now, again, we've had more than a year to think about this. I tell you, oh man, the day this passed, and I said to my then 12-year-old daughter, look, um,

good news, we're going to give you Snapchat on your 13th birthday. Bad news

is you're going to lose it a few months later and then you'll have to wait nearly three years to get it back.

So, government decided that is the approach that they're going to take. you

need to be 16.

Now, in fairness to the government and and just before we go into this, every single one of these debates where particularly where the government passes things, there are going to be good things about it. There are going to be bad things. Everyone's going to have

bad things. Everyone's going to have their own sort of moral compass or comfort level of where the needle sits.

It is not all one thing.

And every response here which was so absolute in their feelings is wrong. Like everyone

who is completely absolute is wrong because there are always always two sides. This government's side is

sides. This government's side is we have these problems. When you think about passing laws that have to cover an

entire country, they're not passed for kids like mine or for parents like me.

They're passed for the masses. And the

government's perspective was there's lots of harms being done to kids along the lines I just mentioned that if we were to defer that exposure for three years, the harm would be less

and they'd be more mature and more able to deal with it. And you you're within two years of being an adult then anyway.

Now, I remember our our Prime Minister Anthony Albanes last year saying, "Uh, this is for the moms and dads who are having trouble keeping it under control.

It's for the moms and dads who get pressure from their kids to give them access to social media because all their other friends have it. This takes the decision away from them and no longer makes them the bad guy." And I can see

where he's coming from here because I was the bad guy for those years before El turned 13 where she didn't get social media. She'd be like, in typical child

media. She'd be like, in typical child style, she'd be like, "All my friends have it." Let's say when she's 12, oh,

have it." Let's say when she's 12, oh, that's interesting. Okay, let's start

that's interesting. Okay, let's start asking them. And about half her friends

asking them. And about half her friends did. It wasn't all. About half her

did. It wasn't all. About half her friends did. And of course they they got

friends did. And of course they they got it because they lied when the when the age question was asked. There's no more formal checks other than that. The

parents were often complicit in it as well. Most of the time the parents

well. Most of the time the parents didn't have any sort of parental controls or anything on the devices. So

the kids could install anything, go anywhere, do anything. Parents had no idea. So of course the kids just were

idea. So of course the kids just were like, "Yeah, I want to get online. I

want to I want to have Snapchat."

But I was the bad guy for saying no.

Now, fortunately, in my daughter's defense, she was never too emphatic about getting access or too upset with me. And of course, she did get access

me. And of course, she did get access once she turned 13.

So, the point is is I understand the peer pressure argument and I understand the argument that if you take that decision away from parents, they no

longer have to be the bad guy. The

problem of course is that all of that is predicated on assuming that the parents don't want the kids to have it in the first place and it's also predicated on us accepting that the government is in the best

position to make the decision on our behalf and take that option away from us. Now I started saying before it's now

us. Now I started saying before it's now incumbent on the platforms to implement the controls. If you as a child use it

the controls. If you as a child use it at 13, you're not in trouble. If you as a parent help your child use it at 13, you're not in trouble.

But if you as a social media platform make it possible for the 13 to have that account, 13-year-old to have that account, you're in trouble. And it could

cost you 50 million bucks.

Now, that's 50 million Australian bucks.

That's only like 32 million American bucks. Like, it's

still a lot of money, right?

So the theory is is that the pressure gets put on these social media platforms which which in fair it's like is the right place to put that onus. The

problem then is this whole thing about how do you do it and it's a little bit like the encryption debate. How many

years ago was this a big news topic the whole time where the government would say you need to be able to provide lawful access to communications and it's up to you to figure it out and the platforms would go well hang on a second we've got like end to end

encryption. how are we going to do this?

encryption. how are we going to do this?

and go that might be you guys figure it out and I think in a way that in the case of the kids as well there's differences once we go down the rabbit hole here in the case of the kids it is

really the domain of the platform to figure out how to do that and we'll talk about some of the ways that they can in a moment uh but it does also divest the

government of the responsibility because they're not specifying precisely how to do it and without going through and reading boring legislation The general

sentiment is is that there needs to be controls that go beyond what's your date of birth. I'll give you an example of

of birth. I'll give you an example of the way a lot of our controls work. I

like pirate life beer and if I search for pirate life beer, I immediately get an ad and I click on the wrong thing because Google is a cesspool of ads.

Anyway, if I scroll down, I get another ad. And if I keep going way way way way

ad. And if I keep going way way way way down the page, why does it say now? Like why is is it

sponsored? I literally And then I get

sponsored? I literally And then I get beer cartel.

What?

Literally, it's probably like piratelife.com.au.

Oh, here's pirateife brewing, which is Oh, no. Here we go. pirateife.com.au.

Oh, no. Here we go. pirateife.com.au.

you that's it's honestly Google's so cooked.

Anyway, so we go there. You must be at least 18 plus to enter. And then there's a button. It says I am 18 years of age

a button. It says I am 18 years of age or older. Good to go. Like now here's to

or older. Good to go. Like now here's to be clear this doesn't mean you can now order beer and get it delivered to you and drink it. But it's an age gate which is clearly easily circumventable in the

same way age gates where it asks your actual date of birth are clearly easily circumventable. And that's the way it

circumventable. And that's the way it was with social media platforms up until now. You could just simply put in your

now. You could just simply put in your age and make yourself a year old or 5 years old or whatever. So the

legislation is worded such that that alone is not sufficient. And the

government uses the word reasonable air quoting for people later on. How many

times have you seen this in a legal document? reasonable.

document? reasonable.

You need to take reasonable measures to make sure that people under 16 can't get access.

Now, the way this is implemented is going to be different platform by platform. Some of the mechanisms that

platform. Some of the mechanisms that are being proposed here actually we'll take a step back. One of the early concerns we had is that because you need

to know the age of the person, because you could lie about the age, you're going to have to ask everyone their age.

And not just ask it in like the pirate life beer kind of way, but get everyone including me in my late 40s to provide

some form of identity proof to prove that I am old enough, over 16. Now, that

was one of the early concerns. That does

not seem like it is going to happen for a very simple reason.

The way this legislation is worded, it appears that social media platforms can use usage data to draw reasonable

conclude reasonable conclusions about people's age. Now, for me, you can see

people's age. Now, for me, you can see it on my ex account. All right. What

does my ex account say about me? If I go on profile summary, Oh. Oh, that's a Grock generate profile

Oh. Oh, that's a Grock generate profile summary. I don't need that. If I go to

summary. I don't need that. If I go to my actual account, it'll say I've had exit or Twitter since I think 20 2008.

Now, that is 17 years ago. So, clearly

I'm going to be well beyond that minimum 16 years age limit. So, that's that's number one. So there should not be a

number one. So there should not be a circumstance in my case where I would need to provide identity verification data because it is self-evident

using reasonable means that I'm over 16. The same with my other social media accounts. Now let's say I got Snap I think I got Snapchat in

like 2019.

So let's say hypothetically I got it when I was 9 years old.

But what do my usage patterns tell us?

Now, here's like a slight divestment from our divestment. A you know, every one of these social media platforms

is an advertising machine.

There is so much information put in front of people and there are so many connections that you have and there are so many things that you either click on or just hesitate long enough to read that these platforms have a very deep

understanding about your demographic.

If you were to look at the demographic of the things that I look at and the things that I'm interested in, it's going to be fundamentally different to that of a teenager.

Now, I know that because I get targeted things that aren't relevant for teenagers. Uh, some of them are good. I

teenagers. Uh, some of them are good. I

like seeing Ferrari ads. It's fantastic.

I don't have a problem with that. Some

of them are like, well, you know, do you do you need uh hair replacement therapy or something? Uh, no. I'm thinking I'm

or something? Uh, no. I'm thinking I'm fine. other things are much more like

fine. other things are much more like wow okay that's I'm getting older anyway the point is the platforms understand and within this legislation there is the

ability or behavioral analytics for one of a better term to be a factor in determining age now what we're going to have is we're going to have a situation

where people say in my my demographic are very very clearly with a very high degree of confidence over 16 all right totally out of scope There is going to be a bracket at the

other end of the scale which is L's situation where she put in her correct date of birth and she got this message here. Account will be locked on deck 10.

here. Account will be locked on deck 10.

Australian law now requires you to verify that you're 16 or older to continue using Snapchat. And that's it.

Crystal clear. Crystal clear. Now that's

a gray area. Our son is 16. He is old enough. But I would imagine that it is

enough. But I would imagine that it is very hard to tell the difference between someone who turns 16 only very recently and someone who might be 15 and a half.

That gray area is going to necessitate identity proof. I'm going to rephrase

identity proof. I'm going to rephrase it. That gray area is going to

it. That gray area is going to necessitate proof of age and it's not going to be self- selecting.

So you're going to have to prove you're that age. So how do we do proof of age?

that age. So how do we do proof of age?

Well, you know, the obvious one is scan your let's say your driver's license because he's 16. He has a learner's permit. He has a governmentissued ID. He

permit. He has a governmentissued ID. He

has a passport as well.

We all feel awkward about this, right?

Like we all feel awkward about particularly for our kids taking identity documents, scanning them, uploading them into the cloud for a social media platform to review. And we

feel awkward about that because identity documents are used for things like identity proof which is used for getting loans, doing tax returns, all sorts of other things which then get us into this

space which I'm much more familiar with around privacy, cyber security, scams, impersonation, all the rest of it. And we've seen this go wrong. We saw

it. And we've seen this go wrong. We saw

this with Discord last month with Discord.

don't know if it was them directly or a third party which doesn't matter because it's still Discord had a whole bunch of identity data exposed because they had to start implementing age gates based on the online safety act in the UK which

required them to or or rather verify the age of individuals and the way they were doing that was people holding up driver's licenses like this and taking photos and then that got leaked and that's one of the big concerns we have

here identity verification which then leaks and falls into unauthorized hands bleing data just says third party working for discord I believe we'll get

to those other comments a m um that's one of our concerns what if the identity verification data leaks the other concern is

how do you do age verification in a privacy preserving fashion now what I mean by this is what if you're on

let's say it's x what if you're on under a pseudonym. And it doesn't matter why. Maybe it's due to your sexuality.

why. Maybe it's due to your sexuality.

Maybe it's due to your political allegiances. Maybe it's because you just

allegiances. Maybe it's because you just don't want to have an online footprint.

What if you want to have that anonymity and now you've got to show documentation which then effectively doxes? You show

that or you lose your account.

So, if you're like, let's just pick I think the the example which is admittedly very niche, but it is often the one that's used.

Let's say you're you're 16 and you're transgender and you want to maintain your privacy.

That's that kind of area where it starts to get more awkward.

So, what are the solutions around this?

Well, some of the things we're seeing and I said to both my kids over the next two weeks, could you screen grab and send me every single thing you see that's effectively what's in this parent

tweet? And actually, I should probably

tweet? And actually, I should probably for the sake of uh folks following at home, let's just copy that parent tweet and drop that in the chat.

So, we'll see what those options are. Uh

we have seen models that include things like uh scanning your face. So, using

the camera on your phone to scan your face, uh, I imagine that some of those could be a little bit more sophisticated and also have speaking and voice and everything else, but

that might help establish that someone is in their 30s, for example.

I'm just not sure what degree of confidence you can reliably get that someone is, let's say, 15 as opposed to 17. It's a

very very Now, how many times do you see someone you go, I'm not sure. They could

be 15, they could be 17. I'm not sure that we can reliably do that with the AI as yet.

So, we're going to end up falling back to other forms of more formal identification.

Now, we'll see what each one of these looks like. And I think as this happens,

looks like. And I think as this happens, I'll just keep adding this thread because obviously it's got a lot of traction. When I say a lot of traction,

traction. When I say a lot of traction, I've had 140,000 views on this this tweet. uh 682 replies.

tweet. uh 682 replies.

All right, so that's the first bit. Let

me read the comments here and then we'll get to the next bit.

Rag said, "It's also the social pressure and behaviors that are amplified in group chats, etc. through social media.

Even if you have these discussions, it's hard for kids to escape that social media lens." I think related to that as

media lens." I think related to that as well is we've all been kids. Many of us have kids. we're all aware of uh being

kids. we're all aware of uh being ostracized as well. Now, one of the things that that I'd always said to my daughter is that

if we got to the point, you know, when she was saying, "All my friends have it." If we had have established that,

it." If we had have established that, and it literally was, just to pick an extreme example, every single one of her friends except her, and she's the one person who doesn't have access to the

social channels where kids are planning parties, uh, talking about the things that have happened at school, just engaging and being social with each other. If she was the one kid who didn't

other. If she was the one kid who didn't have it and it was affecting her social life, I'd give it to her. I would have.

Now, as I said before, she was about the 50% of the kids that didn't have it. But

kids being ostracized is definitely something that we're concerned about.

Now, to that effect as well, as this law comes into place, if everyone is able to circumvent it, I will find a way for her to circumvent

it. I can probably figure it out. Uh, so

it. I can probably figure it out. Uh, so

if that's the case, but if 20% of people circumvent it, too bad. Like, you're not getting it because you're going to be with the four out of five of your mates who don't have it.

Let's have a look at the other comments here before I lose track of everything.

Um, James says, "A social media ban post blew up. I fully agree with the

blew up. I fully agree with the sentiment that we need to prepare our kids to face what is online. I used to post a bulletin boards back in the day."

Yeah. So I uh I got on the internet in 1995 when I was 18. That was the first time I saw the internet. So I got to get to adulthood before internet. And thank

God I got to get to adulthood before camera. Apparently camera phones I'm

camera. Apparently camera phones I'm told is a very old person term and you can guess who told me that. But you know what I mean. We got to get maturity. Um

I do agree and I think this is your point here James is uh online life is real life.

Now I vemently dislike this sentiment that I'll put it in a blanket way. Kids

shouldn't be online. They should go outside and play.

It's a little bit like saying kids should only eat Brussels sprouts. It's

like well you should eat some Brussels sprouts. Uh but it is part of a balanced

sprouts. Uh but it is part of a balanced diet and part of a balanced life is that you're outside and playing. And to be clear, we're in the outdoor playground of the world here. We have 300 days of sunshine a year. We've got beach, we've

got water, we got like it's it's amazing. And we are outdoors a lot.

amazing. And we are outdoors a lot.

We're also indoors a lot because that's life and online life is part of that.

And I I think what some people miss when they're like they just shouldn't be online at all. Although some of the comments on this were like kids shouldn't have mobile devices. Like all

right, hang on a second. All right. So,

how do you get the tram? She gets the tram to school and back occasionally taps on and off with her phone. And they

go, "Oh, well, you you just have a you could have a manual card." I said, "Okay, we could." Uh often when she's on the tram, she enjoys cooking and she goes to her mobile device and she looks

up recipes and she comes home and makes a recipe that she's looked up on her mobile device. Should we take that away?

mobile device. Should we take that away?

Oh, well that's but that's a good use of technology. Yeah, that is um

technology. Yeah, that is um we travel a lot. She takes lots of photos with her phone. She's got this amazing history that she'll look back on as an adult and she'll have all these

wonderful She could have a digital camera. or

camera. or all you're doing is supplementing a good use of technology with something else that does the same thing but makes your life harder.

That's not to mention the things like you when Charlotte and I travel a lot.

We FaceTime a lot. We have these lovely highdefinition free video calls with our daughter. It's fantastic. Uh she does a

daughter. It's fantastic. Uh she does a bunch of homework related things need online access. Like there's there's so

online access. Like there's there's so much of real life that is online life, including planning things socially with

friends. I've noticed both the kids use

friends. I've noticed both the kids use Snapchat a lot because that's where their group of friends are, that's where the people are, and they plan to go to

the beach or go shopping together or do stuff like this.

Like I said before, any of these like blanket views are wrong. And the view that kids should not have mobile devices at all or social media at all are uh wrong. Like that's the only thing I'm

wrong. Like that's the only thing I'm like absolutely emphatic about that I'm absolute about. It is simply a question

absolute about. It is simply a question of appropriate use. All right, back on the comments here.

A comment here from a very long username. How's validation going to end

username. How's validation going to end up working? The only way I can see it

up working? The only way I can see it working reliably is giving out ID. Well,

we kind of covered this as well. So,

we've touched on that. Uh, and they said a new Optus event every month. So, for

folks from other parts of the world, Optus, our second largest telco, 2022, they had a major data breach. It leaked

a bunch of driver's license data which then resulted in cues and cues of people around the block at motor registries getting new driver's licenses. Like, it

was it was an absolute mess.

Um Aaron, does Ubiquity have good parental controls? Let's talk about parental

controls? Let's talk about parental controls. That's a good good point,

controls. That's a good good point, Aaron. Um so Ubiquiti being my network

Aaron. Um so Ubiquiti being my network provider. Uh they do have an ability to

provider. Uh they do have an ability to have uh access to DNS block list. I use

a Pi Hole. So Pi Hole, it runs on a Raspberry Pi. It's free open source

Raspberry Pi. It's free open source software. You can download block list to

software. You can download block list to that which will block not beer websites because that worked but it will block uh known porn sites uh malware sites trackers all this sort of thing stuff

that is known.

The way you get around that and our kids know this because I talked to them about it is you disconnect from the Wi-Fi. Now

you're on cellular.

It's a little bit like the schools have network appliances to block certain services and the kids know pull out your mobile phone which you're not meant to have in class but the ability is there.

Pull out the mobile phone turn off the Wi-Fi or if you have a laptop with cellular capability you just drop to cellular and now you have access to everything. So let's talk about this

everything. So let's talk about this sort of uh hard controls versus let's call them soft controls because I think that's part of the discussion here and

it's a little bit like in infosc where we need to have uh controls that are implemented by websites that don't allow bad passwords for example you know the word password with a capital P and an at

symbol and a zero is a terrible password regardless of password complexity criteria it's just terrible as website operators we shouldn't allow that. That's that is a firm technical control. And then we

need to have social controls around how we teach people about what is good password hygiene. And you should have a

password hygiene. And you should have a password manager and strong and unique and all the rest of it. So with the kids, it is a combination of hard controls, the pie hole here, uh on their

Apple things. They're part of our family

Apple things. They're part of our family group. As the course of time has passed

group. As the course of time has passed and they've got older, we've relaxed controls, but there have been controls around things like screen time. This is

free. It's built into iOS. You don't go and pay a third party company money for a product. You literally just turn on

a product. You literally just turn on the features and you can limit the amount of time they spend full stop or the amount of time they spend on certain classes of apps. You can report on it.

You don't have access to their photos and their messages and other privacy invasive things like that. Whole other

topic there about spyware. But the point is that there are hard controls.

The soft controls I think are really really important and it brings us back to the core of this issue around the things that kids are exposed to online.

Also brings us back to things like the online safety act in the UK where you got to prove age to access certain types of content.

Anybody, kids especially, will always find a way to see porn. Let's just put it very

bluntly. If you don't believe me, not

bluntly. If you don't believe me, not now. Wait until I'm finished and find a

now. Wait until I'm finished and find a quiet moment somewhere. Try searching X for porn. Try searching Google for porn.

for porn. Try searching Google for porn.

It's it's like it's ridiculous. And and

like, okay, I say this with like half a smirk, but it is fascinating how easy it is to access this content.

It's not only that, but how easy it is to accidentally see this content. Now,

going back to my earlier point about me getting targeted with certain content because of my demographic, I'm sure that there are many people in my demographic who like to see

the sorts of ladies that seem to now be appearing on my Facebook profile all the time or my Facebook feed the whole time.

The point is is that you will accidentally come across all sorts of things as adults and as kids. And hard

controls are great and they're necessary, but soft controls and education are absolutely foundational and they prevail across

every platform and every security control. And what I mean by that, it's

control. And what I mean by that, it's it's not all just about porn, but let's talk about scams. You know, in Australia, we're done for apparently about $3 billion a year of reported

scams. We don't know about the ones people don't report. Scams are

everywhere.

We should have ad blockers and tools that can identify when you're on a fishing page and all the rest of it. But

we should also have education of the kids so they understand what scam what a scam looks like. Not not just the kids, the adults as well. Uh discussions with

the kids to understand what is the beginning of bullying or potential grooming or any of the other nasty things that happen online. And one of the things that I worry about with all

of this is that there is this intention to hide things from kids until they are 16 with the assumption that they will then no longer see it. Now that there's

a deliberately oversimplified example, but when we look at what's in scope, in fact, probably should talk about what's in scope. If we look at the e safety

in scope. If we look at the e safety commissioner website, when we look at the social media platforms that are in scope, they're obvious. They're things that you would

obvious. They're things that you would expect for the most part. Uh let's have a look at what's in scope.

Oh, here we go. Just found it. Which

platforms will be age restricted? Okay,

I'm going to uh you know what? Here we

go. I'm going to drop the FAQs here into the chat.

So these will be pretty obvious.

Facebook, Instagram, kick, bit less obvious. Reddit, Snapchat, threads. Is

obvious. Reddit, Snapchat, threads. Is

anyone using threads? Doesn't feel like a great loss. Tik Tok, Twitch, X, and YouTube. Come back to YouTube now. Not

YouTube. Come back to YouTube now. Not

in scope. Interestingly, Pinterest. Uh,

and in fact, they made a point saying Pinterest is not in scope. And it looks like that their definition here, in fact, I'll just read it. Services that e safety considers do not currently meet

the criteria for being age restricted social media platforms including those that fall within an exclusion in the legislative rules include Discord, GitHub, Google Classroom, Lego Play,

Messenger Pinterest Roblox, which is kind of ironic because there was a lot of news recently about people in Roblox doing completely

inappropriate things to mess with kids.

Anyway, WhatsApp, YouTube Kids. Now, obviously

something like and like not mentioned here. Telegram,

here. Telegram, there's a lot of nasty stuff on Telegram. My point is is that there are

Telegram. My point is is that there are all these other things that kids will still use and they will still see porn and gore and get groomed and all the rest of it. Like that was still going to happen. And we got to hear because I was

happen. And we got to hear because I was saying how important these self-controls are that the education of kids and it's not just telling them about the risks

online. It's behaviors like

online. It's behaviors like how many kids in households where again they're probably smarter than the parents. How many kids are sitting in

parents. How many kids are sitting in their room on their own experiencing all of the things of the internet without not necessarily supervision but without

someone in the kitchen making dinner and they're sitting on the couch and they're like, "Hey dad, I just saw this thing.

You know what what is this?" Or, "Hey, I just got this weird request online."

they go largely unmonitored and they experience all these things on their own and they have to figure out themselves what these things mean which can be

confusing for a young kid and they will still see that with these platforms banned and I think that's a really really important thing like just because the government's like you now need to be

16 to use Snapchat doesn't mean you're not now going to be bullied via iMessage instead like it's it it's absolutely going to happen it will move to somewhere else. And that's one of the

somewhere else. And that's one of the one of the big concerns I have over this. Let's look at the other comments.

this. Let's look at the other comments.

Now, Blinking Do says guessing age based on usage data is not going to be reliable. And what about new accounts?

reliable. And what about new accounts?

There's no usage data to determine one's age. Then um

age. Then um anything like this is about degrees of confidence level. And again is very much

confidence level. And again is very much like infosc when we're looking at the let's say the behavior of a certain account. I'll give you a good example.

account. I'll give you a good example.

Uh a company that we all know contacted me some time ago and said we're using have been pone to try and identify bot accounts. And and the way we're using it

accounts. And and the way we're using it is because we have all been so poned. If

someone signs up with an email address that is not in have been pawned, they're more likely to be a bot. Or to

put it another way, if someone signs up with an email address that was in the Dropbox data breach in 2012, 13 years ago, and then they've got a few others

since then, which most people do, this organization can go, my confidence level in the legitimacy of the address is higher. It's not absolute. It's not a

higher. It's not absolute. It's not a hard and fast rule. to your point, you could have a new account, perfectly legitimate person, doesn't mean they're a bot, but it's about confidence level.

And then there are many, many other different attributes that can be used to try and establish the legitimacy of the account. So in this case when we talk

account. So in this case when we talk about behavioral analytics in my case you could look at my Facebook usage see it going back to 2008 see this

long history the people I engage in the things I look at and with a very extremely high degree of confidence say that I'm over 16 now obviously the younger you are the

less confidence you're going to have and to your point someone brand new now perhaps someone brand new signing up from Australia in Australia. We'll talk about the

in Australia. We'll talk about the geocation stuff for a moment too.

Perhaps there will be additional criteria required to establish age.

That may mean identity documentation. It

may mean photos and videos and whatever else. We'll have to see like this. This

else. We'll have to see like this. This

is what I'm really curious about. Uh and

it's been left vague enough by the government to try and figure it out. My

point is is that there is a lot of value around analytical uh or or rather analysis of usage behavior. But to your point, it's

usage behavior. But to your point, it's not a silver bullet. It's not going to solve everything.

So long username affliction of arada.

I've come to accept opaque secret algorithms. Not even the creator's understanding determining all kinds of important stuff in the future. even in

the form of people outsourcing thought to LLMs. Yeah. And we are in the era of AI as well. The things that you can derive from very small snippets of data.

Keep in mind as well, it's not just your usage behavior. There's all the other

usage behavior. There's all the other things that that are little tells about identity as well. It could be anything from the the device. I'm sure that there are

identifiable patterns that can influence confidence level based on device type, device age, add in IP address as well that can start to contribute to this

confidence level. I I think what's going

confidence level. I I think what's going to be incumbent on the the social media platforms is that when we have cases of let's say 13y olds still having access

to Snapchat uh and particularly if there's an adverse outcome as a result of that um you know that they do get groomed and it leads to something tragic and then this platform gets brought up

before the courts please explain what did you do they're going to have to detail every single one of these measures that they used in order to try and figure out whether this person was

of age or not. So people are doing that.

Good day, Scott. Scott's here.

Blinking data. You simply cannot verify one's exact age without some kind of ID scanning. Yeah. And I I agree, but I

scanning. Yeah. And I I agree, but I would also say you don't need exact age in most cases. I'll give you a good example. We here in Australia, like most

example. We here in Australia, like most of the world, you got to be 18 to go and buy alcohol. Uh now we have these

buy alcohol. Uh now we have these standard signs that are that are produced by the responsible service of alcohol council department whatever it is. You

go in the bottle shop it says if you look under 25 your ID needs to be asked for you. Okay. Well that that kind of makes

you. Okay. Well that that kind of makes sense because 18 to 25 and okay someone's still making a judgment call. you know, they're

judgment call. you know, they're probably like some lowly played store clerk behind the counter having to look at someone and decide whether they're over 25 or not. My point is is that if

you take that demographic of people that are in that bracket of 18 to 25, we've got this 7-year bracket here where everything's a bit ambiguous over that.

It's you're fine, you just get in. You

don't need to know my exact age to know that I should have access.

It's just those ones in that shoulder.

Question here, you mentioned circumvention. What could consequences

circumvention. What could consequences for parents aid in circumvention even look like? What about inappropriate use

look like? What about inappropriate use of uh authorized online services? So,

the consequences for both individuals, the kids and parents are nil. And the

government's been very clear about that.

You're not on the hook for this. The

consequences for the social media platform is potentially $50 million. So,

that's where the consequences are. Let's

talk more about circumvention because I had so many people come back and say, uh, just get a VPN. Now,

getting my iPad over here because it's just easier to flick through some of the comments.

If you look at the legislation and you consider reasonable controls, I would argue that a VPN being the single thing that allows you

to circumvent this is not a reasonable control.

Getting to that point, you then start to pile on what are all the other observable things that a platform could use to determine that someone might actually be in Australia and too young.

The obvious one is geoloccation. as soon

as you give access to geoloccation and this person is regularly in Australia.

That's a bit of a tip. Uh you could say, well, you just don't turn on geoloccation. Well, first of all, most

geoloccation. Well, first of all, most people already have. Incidentally, just

a side note, one of the things I verminently disagree with this about this whole thing is taking something away from people that already have it.

Now, this is not just me having a personal gripe about this because of my daughter, but her waiting until she was of the I don't think legal is the right term, but but of the age where the

platforms say you can now come and have an account, waiting until then, doing the right thing, getting access, using it responsibly, then having it taken away. I don't like I would have far

away. I don't like I would have far preferred to see existing users grandfathered in.

government could have said anyone who was born before whatever date it is I guess in 2012 uh they're within scope you know the

kids who've lied about their age uh and are still 12 they're within scope existing users grandfathered in you're okay uh let's just roll this whole thing out it's only going to take three years

anyway and then you're basically where we are now so that's what I would have rather see happen Um, geoloccation. Anyone who's already had

geoloccation. Anyone who's already had that turned on, you've got a rich history of geoloccation.

Where your social networks are based.

Hey, look at this person. It's like they keep they keep logging in from Zimbabwe.

Thank you, VPN provider. Uh, but all their friends are in Australia. Um, the

interests that you have will be geographically specific. Yeah, this

geographically specific. Yeah, this person's in Zimbabwe. Why do they keep looking at information about concerts in Australia?

There are many different things about behavior which VPNs won't hide. The other thing is you got to remember to have it on the

whole time. You know, it's there are

whole time. You know, it's there are many a hacker out there who just that one time didn't have their VPN on and it brings down the whole house of cards because it's expose their Origin IP and

it's game over. That one time you don't have the VPN on. And let's face it, most people are also roaming between Wi-Fi and cellular. And yes, you can have a

and cellular. And yes, you can have a kill switch on a VPN such that there's no connectivity if the VPN's not working. But you will constantly have

working. But you will constantly have this scenario where just that one time is going to be enough to reveal your true location.

So VPNs are not going to fix this. And I

will be very very surprised if a they do and b the banhammer isn't bought down really quickly on social media providers who are allowing people to circumvent

this by the use of a VPN alone.

That's my thoughts on that.

Uh, looking at the other comments here.

Aaron segmenting some networks. Another

topic for another day.

Jan's here says, "The thing is your soft control there requires trust between the young person and the parent, which I'm sure you know is touchy sometimes."

Yeah, and I agree. And it's not just trust, it's the parent actually knowing what they're doing as well. and the

parent being both willing and able to invest the time. And and really what you're kind of doing here is is highlighting the government's position, which is the parents can't just do this on their own, and they need government

intervention in order to actually achieve that.

And and there is truth to that. again

like I don't agree with it quite the way it is and I'll I'll talk in a moment about how I think it should have been done but there is truth to what you've just said and that is why we have this

now as you've then said you tell the kid don't touch fire but they still do it oh lord yeah says what I don't get about the 25 law

is an 18year-old can sell you the alcohol and judge your age you know what it's even less than 18 I learned this the other day so we have a friend who's got a 16-year-old son and he can serve

alcohol at a drive-through bottle shop.

And that sounds really, really weird.

And I double and I triple check this and it is actually legit because he's got to do the responsible service of alcohol training. He can't taste the alcohol,

training. He can't taste the alcohol, but he can sell the alcohol to adults and he can challenge adults to provide

ID. In fact, he has to if they look

ID. In fact, he has to if they look under 25. So yeah, you can be under 18

under 25. So yeah, you can be under 18 and actually serve at least serve enclosed alcohol. I'm not sure that he

enclosed alcohol. I'm not sure that he could work in a bar, but he can work in a in Australia we call him a bottle shop and off license. Scott uh an offlic and actually serve alcohol that way.

Scott says, "Now TV streaming services won't allow me to stream the F1 without geoloccation enabled, so you can't trivially VPN around it." Now, I figured that out the other day as well when we

were in Belgium and I was trying to watch the F1 with my uh I was trying to use the KO app which I have a subscription for and normally in the

past I have just VPN back into Australia and we're fine and now it's like n doesn't work. In fact, what was weird it

doesn't work. In fact, what was weird it didn't work on my iPad so we end up watching the F1 on my iPhone which it did work on when I was VPN in Australia.

So, who knows? Sonia, good day. Sonia

Sonia's here. Why do platforms need to keep age verification documentation once it's validated to prove they actually did it? Wouldn't it minimize the risk of

did it? Wouldn't it minimize the risk of data if it wasn't stored? And this is the Optus argument as well and someone mentioned Optus earlier on where they did identity verification and then they kept all of the information and then

they had a data breach and it got exposed. I I think the usual argument

exposed. I I think the usual argument there and we obviously have technical controls that could achieve a similar result is that if they if they get audited or they have to prove that they

did do identity verification like you know little Johnny's seen some seen some boobs uh well you know we went through we asked little Johnny here's his scan okay it's a fake ID we established that

later on but here is the proof that we did actually do age verific Okay, like we didn't do very well. Here's the proof that we did it. But it it's that old adage of you can't lose what you don't

have. So if we didn't have that, then

have. So if we didn't have that, then that part of the concern would go away.

We'd have other concerns.

Scott says, "If you're streaming on a phone, you have to grant location services, so the VPN doesn't help." And

I think that's what happened to my iPad, but maybe I just had like an older version of the app on the phone and it didn't I don't know. It It's annoying, though.

Marrick says, "You don't need geoloccation. Many of the non-geeotagged

geoloccation. Many of the non-geeotagged photos in Google Photos can be searched on where they were taken." But I mean, that's I think that's a perfect point because most of the photos we take on these

devices are going to have geotags in them. And then because of the nature of

them. And then because of the nature of social media, you're going to want to be able to share those photos so they have access to your photos.

And then if that doesn't line up with your IP, you see what I mean? like there

this this argument that just get a VPN and you're fine just really really doesn't fly even if you have seven VPNs how you use

a service or what if you upload even time frequency can be used against you time frequency is another good point um there are very predictable usage patterns that align with times of the

day and if your IP address doesn't align with that then you're going to have a problem so what you got to do kids is you got to VP VPN into a place that's on the same so longitude or latitude, the

upy down one. You know, like if you're in Australia, VPN into Singapore. Um,

but as we've already established, that that alone shouldn't be sufficient.

Bundbound says, "Rather than require an ID, would be handy if maybe the government provided a service that said this person is over 16 but not provide further information." Right? All right,

further information." Right? All right,

let's talk about that because there's a lot of truth in this and some problems. Uh, now we I can't show it to you because it's my driver's license, but we got digital driver's licenses in

our state a few years ago. And I'll I'll walk you through the way it works when you want to share your license because it's actually very very cool.

Think about the times that you need to show your license. Now, the two most common ways are

you've been pulled over by the cops.

When that last happened to me, a decade ago, probably. I've been mostly good.

ago, probably. I've been mostly good.

Uh, get pulled over by the cops. You got

to show your license. Your license needs to, at least here, and assume it's very similar most of the world. Your license

need to have your photo, your name, uh, your date of birth, your home address.

It needs to have the the classes of vehicle that you're licensed to drive.

It has a lot of personal information.

The other time you're most likely to pull out your license is when you need to prove that you're old enough to get beer. So, you go in a pub. Here in

beer. So, you go in a pub. Here in

Australia, it's 18. Now, what do you need to show to get beer? In the past, when we had physical driver's licenses, you would hand over that physical driver's Let's pick a scenario here.

Let's say uh you're a young woman and there's a sleazy bartender and you've just handed over your driver's license.

Not only does it have your full date of birth, but it has your home address on it and it has your photo.

That's bad. Like there's obvious privacy risk to that because what did the bartender actually need to know? They

only need to know one thing. Am I older than 18? That's the only thing. So what

than 18? That's the only thing. So what

we have with the digital driver's licenses is I can go into digital driver's license here. Uh, I can see all of the stuff here as I look at the whole

thing that has uh that was on my physical driver's license, but I've then got a show QR button and I can generate

a QR code and I can decide what I want to share on that QR code. Just remember

how to do it. Ah, all right. So, I I can I can show this screen. Select the

information you need. There's a screen here where you get to decide what information are you going to show. Now,

actually, now this goes the other way.

So, every one of these licenses is or or or license apps is not just uh a retention of your own license, but you can scan someone else's license. So, the

bartender, for example, can use their own phone with the scanning app. And

what happens is I've selected scan QR and I can now tap a button which says someone is 18 plus. Now it says do you need to retain this information? The app

will request consent from the person whose details you are verifying. And on

this show 18 plus screen let's try and get that so you can see without too much glare. It says it's going to show the

glare. It says it's going to show the photo and an over 18 indicator.

And that's really good because what happens then is when you scan the other person's QR code on their device, it's like, do you want to share your photo and the fact you're over 18 and that's

it. There's a little slider here I

it. There's a little slider here I hadn't noticed before. It says, I am going to retain these details. And I

assume that that information is then conveyed to the target wallet or target digital drive. I mean, there's also

digital drive. I mean, there's also other stuff in here. Uh, there's a lot of stuff. uh QBCC contract license,

of stuff. uh QBCC contract license, which I think is the Queensland Building Council something. So, if you were to

Council something. So, if you were to share or if you were to request that of someone, it would have their photo, their name, their license details, the issuing country, and the issuing

authority. That's really cool. If you

authority. That's really cool. If you

were to request the marine license, I have a boat license. Uh, if I get pulled over by the water police.

Photo, name, date of birth, over 18 indicator. Kind of seems redundant if

indicator. Kind of seems redundant if you got the date of birth. License

number, Queensland marine license details address signature card number, issuing country, issuing authority. Now, that's what the water

authority. Now, that's what the water police or if we're on the road, the highway police would actually need. So

that's kind of like the the long answer to we have technical constructs that can convey just sufficient information

to be able to in the case of the social media thing here prove that you're 16.

But here are the problems with that.

First problem is is that you've got to have 16y olds having this form of very formal identification. Now, as I said

formal identification. Now, as I said earlier on, when you're 16 in Australia, you can get your learner's permit. Our

son has his learner's permit. It's

effectively a driver's license. He has

the same digital driver's license app.

Lots of kids don't get that until much later on. Maybe they don't want to

later on. Maybe they don't want to drive.

So, should they then be excluded from using social media because they don't have this very formal version of government ID?

The other thing is is that you will always have to overcome the social barrier which is do I want to show a government ID in

order to use Snapchat and it doesn't matter how well it's implemented and from everything I've seen I think this one's implemented very very well by the way it's statebyst

state in Australia as well so there's another another problem for um uh for the social media platforms but Maybe you don't want to show a former government

ID. And even though in this case, let's

ID. And even though in this case, let's say use the driver's license model here.

Even if it is only showing like your photo and the fact that you're 16 or over, people will push back because it's a government ID and I'm accessing this service showing government ID. And it

doesn't matter that the technical controls may not relay any personal information and it may not matter that you can still be completely anonymous.

that's still going to be a barrier to entry and people will say privacy anonymity not happy about this. So that

remains a problem.

Blinking do says I hate the idea that the government is providing an age verification service. It's too much

verification service. It's too much control to them that they could abuse.

Well, let me argue this both ways. First

of all, the government knows who you are. As soon as you're born, they know

are. As soon as you're born, they know who you are. I uh this is a true story.

I did it. I remember I was I was in Perth. I was doing a user group talk and

Perth. I was doing a user group talk and we were talking about digital driver's licenses and I was sort of talking about everything that I just showed you there with the license with the QR code and requesting information. And I kid you

requesting information. And I kid you not, there was someone in the audience who said, "I don't like this. I don't want to give the government that information."

So, well, do you have a driver's license at the moment? Yeah. Well, they already have that information. Like, it's it's all there already.

It is the connection or the perceived connection of that information which the government already has about you to the services that you may not want to create the association to that that's the problem

and I think blinking do that is your point here now bring what are we we're already more than an hour into this but I just think it's

interesting apparently a bunch you do too because there's plenty of people left Uh the next problem here, where was I going with this uh verification? Oh yes,

there's there's a whole tinfoil hat I think is the only reasonable way of putting this tinfoil hat view that the government is only

doing this to push a government ID and get everybody's datas.

Now, I don't agree with that. And and

part of the reason I don't agree with that is because I think the reasons that they have represented for doing this are actually very valid. We're going to get to the bit with how I do this

differently. But

differently. But when we when we sort of go back to let's literally on the E safety commissioners page here

uh when we go back to looking at why they're doing this. So here we go. The

age restrictions aim to protect under 16s from pressures and risks they can be exposed to while logged into social media accounts. These come from design

media accounts. These come from design features in the platform that encourage them to spend too much time on screens, for example, by prompting them with streams of notifications and alerts and pressuring them to view disappearing

content, increase the likelihood of exposure to negative, upsetting, or manipulative content served up in their feeds by algorithms. These features have been linked to harms to health and

well-being, including increased stress levels and reduced sleep and concentration.

That is 100% accurate. That is a real problem. And incidentally, Australia is

problem. And incidentally, Australia is going to be the first country, as far as I know, to do this for under 16s. But

many other countries are planning similar things. And I know that they're

similar things. And I know that they're watching very closely what we're doing here in Australia. This is not just an Australian government overreach thing.

This is a genuine health concern.

So I don't like the argument that this is only being done for nefarious reasons. And I think what sometimes what

reasons. And I think what sometimes what people miss, I have a bit of a different view on this because I get to spend a lot of time with government and a lot of time with law enforcement. And every

single one of those people making these decisions put their pants on one leg at a time and they have kids and they have families and they have the same sorts of problems

that all of us have. It is not some sort of cabal of overlords sitting there figuring out how to get into all your things.

Undoubtedly, there are times where there's government overreach and things that are done that I don't think are in our best interest. But I don't like the assertion that this is only there because there's a whole bunch of people

figuring out how to mess with our lives.

That's just wrong.

Now, does it as a side effect drive us more towards digital IDs? Potentially,

yes. And there's pros and cons to that.

One of the massive problems that we have as a generalization on the internet, and Scott can speak to this very well also, is identity verification. How do we know

who we're talking to when we really need to know. How do we know which website

to know. How do we know which website we're talking to? When we really need to know. Yeah, I have very publicly fallen

know. Yeah, I have very publicly fallen victim to a fishing attack before because I thought I was in a place which was different to the real place. It's

it's a hard problem. We don't have good solutions to it. How do we prove the identity of an individual? I I signed up at a new financial institution this week.

You know how they password protected the documents they sent to me?

last name plus postcode.

That's what identity verification looks like today. Uh I know that our

like today. Uh I know that our accounting firm, the way they password protect the PDFs that they send me is date of birth. Like and and the reason

they do that is because we don't have good consistent unified identity verification technology.

The only way that we're going to be able to do this in a consistent fashion is going to be a government ID. Like we do not have the ability to do that via a social media platform. Uh particularly

ones that are based in the US and most of us are somewhere else. 96% of people are not American. I know this comes as a shock to some Americans, but yeah, most of the world is not. government identif

identity verification technology can do an awful lot of really good stuff but there are the privacy concerns like that's that's not to downplay the point

that you've made here but I don't want to I think it's just sort of throwing the baby out with the bath water a bit like anything government is just bad uh as above opaque algorithms they work

99% are good enough these days so so here's the other way of thinking about Um, this doesn't have to be perfect. Look, there are things in life

perfect. Look, there are things in life that have to be perfect. Uh, if you are building airplanes, you need to make sure it doesn't crash. Like 99% is not good enough. You need to be 99.99. You

good enough. You need to be 99.99. You

need to be like an absolute hair's breadth of a rounding error of 100% safe all the time. Identity verification for a service like this, let's imagine, for

example, Snapchat gets it right 80% of the time. Four out of every five people

the time. Four out of every five people who are under 16 are correctly excluded from using the platform. One out of

every five manage to sneak through.

What does that mean? Well,

what it means in the case of our daughter is that most of her friends are no longer on Snapchat. So, their social groups will move. They will move away from Snapchat. their dependency on

from Snapchat. their dependency on Snapchat will decrease and they'll all go to iMessage and abuse each other there, right? Like the the thing will

there, right? Like the the thing will move to somewhere else. It doesn't

matter if it's not 100% right. It only

needs to be right enough. And it will be really interesting to see if we get any empirical data later on about how often did the platforms get it right versus get it wrong. I'd love to see that

later.

Uh what else we got here?

Marrick says, "So effectively on the 10th of December, a large number of Australians will instantly move to Japan, Singapore, and such." Well, he might have joined later, but that's that's not going to work. That that

should not be able to work.

Scott says, "I also think getting kids off social is a great thing. I hope they bring similar restrictions in the UK."

Yeah. And look, again, I think it it's how it's done. I mean, Scott's a good example. So, I know that your son and my

example. So, I know that your son and my daughter were communicating on social the other day and I can't even remember what channel it might have been like iMessage or something and it was so nice. We're all going to hang out

nice. We're all going to hang out together for New Year's Eve and uh and the kids were planning some stuff and I think that is an example where technology can be wonderful and it

bridges this gap that we otherwise have from one side of the world to the other and they don't need Snapchat to do that.

They can do that with iMessage or WhatsApp or something like that. Uh, so

I think that's that's fantastic. I like

those cases. Blink data says, "I guess we differ from views is I no longer believe that the EU wants to protect the kids."

kids." But I I think the issue I have with this, and to Marrick's response here, I believe the EU is watching closely and is contemplating introducing some laws.

When you say the EU, you're talking about moms and dads and normal people in government positions

trying to pass policy that okay gets them re-elected. That's one of them. But

them re-elected. That's one of them. But

ultimately to get reelected has to be in the interest of the people and the things that the people are going to vote for. Now these people who are the

for. Now these people who are the lawmakers have the same problems that we have. And and to Scott's point, a bunch

have. And and to Scott's point, a bunch of them are sitting there going, "I think getting kids off social is a good thing because they're having the same

problems. They're still normal people.

They're just doing underpaid jobs where they get to make big decisions by their constituencies or or rather elected by their constituencies. So, I I just think

their constituencies. So, I I just think you just got to be careful with that when I feel like in people's mind there's there's like some big orb up there in the sky with like faceless individuals who are just trying to screw

you over and and honestly couldn't be further from the truth. Again, that's my experience, but I think I'm in a unique position there. All right, so here's how

position there. All right, so here's how I would do this.

I think that there is much more of a continuum or there should be much more of a continuum than no social, no social, no

social, no social, get to 16, all the social. Let's have a 13 to 16 year old

social. Let's have a 13 to 16 year old set of requirements. Now, we could have as an Aussie government said the 13 to 16 year olds all the same identity verification stuff. We already had that

verification stuff. We already had that discussion. Uh but you know what I'm

discussion. Uh but you know what I'm going to do? I'm literally going to read from Instagram for kids because they actually summarize it really really good. So is an Instagram

good. So is an Instagram Instagram for kids uh protection for teens peace of mind or is it Instagram for teens?

So this uh this is September last year introducing Instagram teen accounts built-in protections for teens peace of mind for parents. Uh now let's just see what it actually does so we can cut to

the chase.

There's a video. That's not great.

Oh, here we go. I'm going to drop this in the chat as well for people that are interested.

Private accounts. With default private accounts, teens need to accept new followers and people who don't follow them can't see their content or interact with them. This applies to all teens

with them. This applies to all teens under 16, including those already on Instagram. Messaging restrictions. pins

Instagram. Messaging restrictions. pins

will be placed in the strictest messaging settings. So, they can only be

messaging settings. So, they can only be messaged by people they follow or already connected to. So, just imagine for a moment that our legislation rather than just saying you get nothing at all

was saying that if you are old enough to use the platform 13, but you are under 16, accounts must be private by default.

There must be messaging restrictions so that you can only be messaged by people you already follow or connected to.

Sensitive content restrictions. Teens

will automatically be placed in the most restrictive setting of our sensitive content. Limited interactions. Teens can

content. Limited interactions. Teens can

only be tagged or mentioned by people they follow. Will automatically turn on

they follow. Will automatically turn on the most restrictive version of our anti-bullying feature. Time limit

anti-bullying feature. Time limit reminders. Teens will get notified

reminders. Teens will get notified telling to leave the app after 60 minutes each day. Sleep mode enabled.

Sleep mode will be turned on between 10 p.m. and 7:00 a.m. which will mute

p.m. and 7:00 a.m. which will mute notifications overnight and send auto replies to DMs. This is great. Like this is

fantastic because this gives you the transition from no social media to holy look at all the stuff on the internet. Like that's a good middle

internet. Like that's a good middle ground. It's a three-year transition

ground. It's a three-year transition period.

I'd much rather see the government pass legislation requiring these things and then get the platforms to do. Obviously, Meta has already done this with Instagram anyway,

so they've got one. You know, they're heading in the right direction here.

All right. Uh, now

let's find some of the fun responses. I

I I should have actually favored these.

Uh, I really should have, but it was it was almost a bit, like I said earlier, a little bit reminiscent of the Twitter of old. some of the replies that

came through about uh about this thread. Now, one of the themes was, and this was a really

it's vocally I wish I could find some of these vocally aggressive theme is why would you give your 13-year-old daughter Snapchat is full of pedos?

I think the term I often saw used was it's only used by pedos. Now,

I talk to the kids all the time about this. I see a lot of their social media

this. I see a lot of their social media usage.

On not one occasion ever have I seen or heard anything which could be constituted as pedos/grooming

other than that is a strange looking friend request. Ignore that.

friend request. Ignore that.

So this idea and I felt a bit and I didn't do this because it would only blow things up. I felt a little bit inclined to say well it may have something to do with the way that you interact with people on these

platforms. Obviously everyone's experiences differ but that is just an dumb thing to say like it is not full of pedos. There is a problem with that and

pedos. There is a problem with that and Snapchat appears to be over represented with the grooming problems. But to go back to the point here about these, you know, the Instagram for teens things,

there are other ways of dealing with this as well without killing the platform altogether. Um, one person said

platform altogether. Um, one person said I should be reported for allowing my daughter to have Snapchat

at 13. Uh, I obviously disagree with

at 13. Uh, I obviously disagree with that. I and I put all of this in the in

that. I and I put all of this in the in the tweet thread, but I went and pulled some data on the usage of social media platforms by teenagers. Uh, and I was interested as well like is is is it a is

it a cultural thing? Is it more prevalent, for example, here in Australia? Because as some other people

Australia? Because as some other people said in the thread, they're like every Aussie high schooler, pretty much every Aussie high schooler is on Snapchat and the other ones as well. It is

ubiquitous. Rightly or wrongly, it is very, very extensively used.

So that the premise that somehow you are an irresponsible parent by allowing a 13-year-old to have access to Snapchat does not pass the test.

Uh comment here blinking do clarification not saying that all government is evil just that everyone who's pushing the law is doing it with the best just that not everyone pushing

law is doing with the best intentions in mind. Um,

mind. Um, I I think what we could fairly say is that there are multiple different motivations, but I I do think that most people

recognize that there are risks associated with social media of the kind that I've mentioned before. I feel like the the

mentioned before. I feel like the the the grooming pedo thing is a little bit like sharks in Australia. You know,

people come to Australia uh and they're very worried about the sharks and the spiders and the crocodiles. And every time I have guests

crocodiles. And every time I have guests come here, I'll go, "Do you know what the most deadly animal in Australia is?"

They'll be like, "Oh, like it must be it must be the sharks or the snakes."

So, no, mate, it's horses. Horses are

our number one most deadly animal in Australia. And I'm pretty sure number

Australia. And I'm pretty sure number two is dogs. And you do not see people losing their around horses and dogs, but you do around spiders and crocodiles and things like that. And

it's not just around that, but just the paranoia about people being scared to get in the water. And I say this the day after we've had a fatal shark attack in Australia. So, this is not great timing,

Australia. So, this is not great timing, but I think we when I pulled the stats the other day, we have like 2 point something fatal shark attacks a year in a country where

we're very very centered around the water and we're in the water all the time. But people will lose their

time. But people will lose their about getting in the water because of the worry of a shark attack. And I think a lot of this is the same with with the pedo argument where they're like, I'm

really really worried about my children getting groomed. And you should be very

getting groomed. And you should be very conscious about that.

But in terms of likelihood, you should be much more worried about screen addiction and the long-term negative effects that that has on people. So

anyway, ys and horses. Uh so yeah, that was that was a a constant theme like why would you possibly give people that? I

just again like it's it's parenting is such a personal thing but people have different tolerances but certainly the idea of 13year-olds using social media

should not be seen as something highly unusual or abhorrent or anything like that. That's just that's just not right.

that. That's just that's just not right.

Milford apologies guys just got off the humor aircraft switching back into tech uniform. All right let's do it. Um I

uniform. All right let's do it. Um I

think we're sort of starting to round this out. What else was actually left

this out. What else was actually left there? What else was left in that

there? What else was left in that thread? Uh, what did I put in my

thread? Uh, what did I put in my responses? Because I I didn't expect it

responses? Because I I didn't expect it to kind of blow up that much, but as I saw sort of themes come through, I did try to address I'm sure some people listen, trying to argue

with people on the internet and correct them is is a bit of a, you know, fool's game. Um

game. Um I should have legislated without screen time. Uh

time. Uh oh this this was where I was going before. Different parts of the world do

before. Different parts of the world do tend to have different prevalences. So I

I uh I did a chat to JPT on this about you know what's the distribution of uh social media geographically like is it like a is it a

cultural norm here in Australia and it's very very different somewhere else and the summary here was North America Western Europe Australia and other

highincome countries social media use is close to universal by mid- teens close to universal Uh, another theme that was here was

when people were like, "Why can't you just text her friends instead of using Snapchat?"

Snapchat?" And I sort of touched this earlier on, but you go where your people are. And if

all of your people are on Snapchat, and by people, let's say in the case of my daughter, I mean that that's where all of her friends are. if all of her friends are on Snapchat and she's like,

"Hey, I'm gonna go to iMessage." Well,

mate, you're going to be there on your own. It's a little bit like and and

own. It's a little bit like and and here's a good analogy. Over the course of time, that will change. Look at the way platforms have evolved now. Now,

Snapchat has become very very popular.

Uh certainly when many of us here, including my friends that are on here, started using social media, Snapchat just wasn't a thing. And then it came along and we just weren't that into it.

many of us are still more heavily focused around something like Facebook or X. Uh it is something that will

or X. Uh it is something that will change over the course of time. Now I

think the the the point here is that if all of your friends are in a certain place you will be there. As social media changed let's say with X and people started going to someone like Blue Sky and Masttodon a lot of the argument

indeed my argument as well is I'm going to go where the people are. Now if all of my people are here on X you might dip the toe in the other things but you're still going to be focused around where your people are

over the course of time. has gradually

changed and you'll adapt and it will change as a result of this legislation now as well. They will go to other places. There will be unintended

places. There will be unintended consequences from this. And I'll give you an example of one. Al said the other day, 13year-old Al, she said, "A bunch

of my friends are opening accounts with, and I forget the name of it, but it's made by the makers of Tik Tok. Someone

will probably know and drop in the chat." And I was like, "Huh, can you

chat." And I was like, "Huh, can you show me what that is and I go to the app store and there it is. She's like,

"Yeah, they're just opening accounts there."

there." So, okay. So,

So, okay. So, everybody just goes over there and we just move the problem to somewhere else.

The point is is that if that's where the people go and everyone in a class gets together and they start chatting with each other and like, "Yeah, hey, look, I'm all over here on this new platform."

Then people will go there and then our legislation will adapt. Now

our e safety commissioner has already said they will be adding more platforms over the course of time. YouTube got

added later on. Now incidentally you might look at this and go well that's a mess because YouTube has so many legitimate uses.

My understanding is is that you're still going to be able to go to YouTube and watch videos as part of your class, for example, but it's taking away the ability to have an account and socially

interact with other people via that platform. There is a bit on the E safety

platform. There is a bit on the E safety commission's website about what is it that puts a platform in scope and a lot of it is where the dominant purpose is to engage with other people in a social

fashion. So Pinterest seems to have

fashion. So Pinterest seems to have gotten a pass because the dominant purpose there is you add things to your board and it's very often used in a solitary capacity and I I've certainly

seen my daughter use it to communicate with other friends but that doesn't seem to be the dominant purpose. Now I'm sure if we then get a rush of kids all going to Pinterest and then suddenly that is the place where they get bullied and

screen addicted and everything else then that'll get added to the list as well.

Who knows by that time she might be nearly 16. It won't be a problem.

nearly 16. It won't be a problem.

Anyway, Aaron says, "Shark experts say that Australian sharks and South African sharks have a bad attitude. Why are

people so concerned what other people's kids do? Weirdos." Well,

kids do? Weirdos." Well,

I can understand it in so far as if I see all of my daughter's friends all having social media and she doesn't have it,

I'm concerned about that in so far as it ostracizes her and it puts pressure on her to be part of it. So, I think that's a fair answer to the question. I'm

concerned about what other people's kids do because of that reason because it influences what my kids do. And even if we sort of scroll about before internet

when I was a kid, uh there were still social pressures. It might be what sort

social pressures. It might be what sort of shoes do the other kids have, you know, what are the other kids' houses like? You know, there's always going to

like? You know, there's always going to be social pressures. So I think the answer to that is what other kids do

does have an impact on your kid as well.

Now having said that I think the responses I got near abuse I got ironically enough on social media about the fact that I let my kids use social

media at 13 was was dumb. But here we are. Scott says Arthur. So Arthur is

are. Scott says Arthur. So Arthur is Scott's son is constantly asking for Snapchat now. Now, Arthur, I think we

Snapchat now. Now, Arthur, I think we can say this is is 12, isn't he, man?

Kindly asking Snapchat now, even though kids his age aren't supposed to have it.

Yes. Well, he's obviously under 13. So,

they've obviously all lied somewhere.

Still no Snapchat, though. Um,

the other thing is, as we have all experienced these windows of time as a kid, they feel very long when you're a kid, but they go very fast. So, so

Arthur is going to be 13 very, very soon and maybe he'll get Snapchat. Then he

just won't be able to talk to L. So

they'll have to go to iMessage or someone like that and then L before she knows it is going to be 16 and then she can have all these things again, but by then she'll have a different social norm

and it it won't matter. But

anyway, so that's the situation with that. Um, it would be very interesting

that. Um, it would be very interesting two weeks from now. I think we might go back to the cyber security stuff next week. uh two weeks from now, let's see

week. uh two weeks from now, let's see what this actually looks like because by then I'll have screen grabs and videos and stuff from my kids. I'll know what it is that they're seeing. Uh it'll be really fascinating to see how the

government implements this. Uh we are the guinea pigs here in Australia. This

will be the first of many countries that implement very similar things. There are

some good bits, there are some bad bits.

Let's not paint the whole thing with a negative brush. Uh I certainly can't

negative brush. Uh I certainly can't paint the whole thing with a positive brush either.

Let's wait and see. All right, folks.

Going to wrap it up there. Catch you

next week.