Arkansas House wants you to show ID to use social media

I am shocked that so many people in this thread are okay with this. This is a terrifying bill. This will create the stage for it to be acceptable for companies to ask for ID to create an account.<p>This will end up with the death of anonymity on the internet.<p>Signal will require an ID. Hacker News will require an ID. Reddit will require an ID. Stack Overflow will require an ID. 4chan will be illegal to operate. Your google account may eventually require an ID<p>This is a really slippery slope. Maybe I am overly paranoid, but this seems like really dangerous legislation.<p>I agree that social media is pretty harmful in its current instantiation, but lets start with banning phones at school rather than removing anonymity for every site that &quot;could harm kids&quot;.

This is a real ID system for everybody. Because how these companies such as Meta have trackers in most commercial web pages, it will mean more definite attribution of site visitors.<p>The silver lining is this could encourage more people to use the fediverse which has no ID requirement other than an email address and no tracking.

Since it is controlled by the GOP, I wonder if this is a way to find out who does not &quot;support&quot; the party or start a Social Score like the CCP did a few years ago.<p>More and more it seems that party is loosing its original outlook.

Australia has had three major data breaches in the past year all leaking ID documents and now many people are facing serious and ongoing issues with identity theft.<p>Forcing more companies to collect ID is going to increase cases of identity theft which can cause extreme suffering and in some cases even suicide. Unfortunately this is never considered when a government mandates ID verification. “Protect the children at any cost even if we have no evidence it will work” seems to be the mantra across the world.

Honestly, it sounds like a good idea. You already have to show ID to buy cigarettes or alcohol, and social media is at least as harmful to kids.

Utah just passed the bill this is based on. I&#x27;m sure it will in court for awhile.<p>&gt; If an account holder is a minor, the social media company 33 shall confirm that a minor has consent under subsection (a) of this section 34 to become a new account holder, at the time an Arkansas user opens the 35 account.<p>I don&#x27;t see any text about how they&#x27;re suppose to verify that consent.

It&#x27;s fairly interesting to me that a lot of People seem to be against the idea of showing ID to use social media, but companies like Meta have verification badges that require a Government Issued ID and a Payment Details to further verify your identity, Twitter (which does not seem to require gov ID) and Meta have both said that verified creators will be shown more, while this will obviously de-boosting non-paying, and subsequently non ID verified, users which essentially incentivizes giving these Platforms your personal information in order to actually use them properly.<p>An excerpt from a Meta Article on the matter reads: &quot;At this time, Meta Verified will only support your real name on your profile. Once your profile is verified, you can’t change the profile name, username, date of birth, or photo on your profile without going through the Meta Verified subscription and verifications application process again.&quot;<p>If paid users are being boosted, more people are led to believe they need to pay the monthly fee to be seen, the user base of ID verified users increases, and Social Media basically becomes ID Verified, without the need for any laws to pass.

&gt; The A.C.L.U.’s Speech, Privacy, and Technology project sent me a statement that said the Utah bill and many like it around the country would “restrict the ability of teenagers to explore and make up their own minds about everything...&quot;<p>Does the ACLU realize they are walking right into a trap? Is their position really going to be that parents don&#x27;t have the right to parent their kids? This is not a position you will ever convince mom&#x27;s to agree to. And I think we all know who has been swinging elections lately.<p>There has been a very strange desire by some to get direct access to kids and to influence them without parental approval or supervision. And here the ACLU is putting into broad daylight this idea that kids have complete agency. They do not.<p>For the entire history of parenting, parents have tried to control what their kids are exposed to and most importantly, who they are exposed to. You know, the whole &quot;bad influences&quot; thing? And although I personally believe overprotecting kids is ultimately bad for them and that reality is something they need to understand, I respect that other parents may have different limits.

At this point... I&#x27;m actually ready to play advocate for such a ban. I&#x27;m also not convinced that it would be unconstitutional, as that would call ID for gun purchases, alcohol purchases, and similar into question. And some might say as well that social media isn&#x27;t a physical threat, but that&#x27;s assuming that threats to children&#x27;s mental health are less of a priority than physical threats.<p>As for enforceability, or &quot;they&#x27;ll just use a VPN!&quot; I don&#x27;t really care. It&#x27;s still a crime to speed even if 25% of the road speeds, and it would still be worse without Speed Limits. Criminals sometimes obtain guns, but it doesn&#x27;t mean I don&#x27;t want Gun ID laws.

The best way to finally kill social media.<p>Can&#x27;t wait.

Glad to see we the French are not alone with this brilliant idea. &#x2F;s<p>Adult sites are also supposed to check that, and we all know how effective this is.

It&#x27;s absolutely ridiculous that: 1) most social coordination happens on private corporate servers 2) we&#x27;ll soon be unable to use those servers without showing our &quot;papers&quot;

The constitutional best alternative to banning social media. My only concern is its implication for anonymity... which Big Tech has already shredded anyway.