I use AdGuard on Firefox, and I've seen the pop up. So far I haven't been able to get rid of it, but I can still close it and continue watching.
I also have custom blocking lists, Privacy Badger, tampermonkey and PiHole, so it might be a problem with one of those instead of AdGuard.
I'm not really knowledgeable about verification tokens or verificayion algorythms. I don't know if what you say is possible and secure, as everyone can just copy the "35 years old" token and send it instead of their "14 y o". But I may be really wrong on this one or missing an important thing.
I'm sure we can figure something out, and I'm sure a secure and private algorythm can exist. But who controls and makes it? Wouldn't corporations be incentivized to collect data on their users? They can even anonymize it and sell it. It would technically still be private, because it doesn't have your name on it. But big enough corporations can still assign that information to you. They know that much about you.
I know it's pessimistic, and I totally understand and even agree with you in that blocking domains isn't really a good solution. It could work with less technically inclined children, but there will always be a way to circumvent it.
And I also agree that laws and regulations can't be perfect. There will always be a downside to everything. In this case I'd prefer if they didn't implement the regulation, but who am I to complain. I just wish there were a better alternative for everyone.
Sadly, I agree with you. Most parents don't know how to configure routers or networks.
It's sad to see, because that was the strategy of big internet corporations. Dumb down the complicated process of using the internet, create proprietary solutions that "just work" and teach people that they don't need to know what they're doing anymore, that experts will take care of it.
And while it was great and brought the mass adoption of the internet, it also created a generation that uses everything while knowing very little. It's not only routers or network stuff. I've met people who use Windows daily and didn't know how to install an app or even use the file explorer (they just dropped everything on their desktop). Some people don't even know the difference between the internet and Google.
But these companies and corporations should be limited. There shouldn't be any product that, after purchasing it, you need to download an app in order to use. There shouldn't be any router that purposefully slightly changes GUIs so people are stuck with that brand. Governments should start doing something about it, but most people in power don't understand technology either.
And by the way the internet is evolving, privacy will soon be almost impossible to have. You need to give X corporation your data in order to create a user account on your computer, you need to upload your ID to every webaite who asks, you need to have your phone tapped in order to use your washing machine...
I know it's a very pessimistic point of view, it's just a little rambling on my thoughts on the web. But it really feels like the web is devolving lately, specially with Google's DRM, Manifest V3, Microsoft's ads in Windows or Apple's walled garden.
I don't want to give up my privacy everytime I connect to the internet, and for now I've at least had the option to choose. But if governments start implementing measures like these, I can't really choose an alternetive, it's either no social media and limited internet or give up my info to a 3rd party.
I've already accepted that I'll have to trust some government agency or third party company in order to verify I'm a human or that I'm 18+. But it feels like I'm losing something, not like I've contributed to the security of the net.
I get that I may sound a bit paranoid about this, but I still wouldn't trust that system. How can I know for sure they aren't keeping a track of my whereabouts?
Every website that verifies you needs to ask the service whether you're real or not. How can you be sure they're not telling it who they are? How can you be sure the verification service doesn't know who the requester is?
Same thing goes for storing the ID. You really can't trust when they say they delete the info they get, or that they treat it correctly. But even if they weren't storing the IDs, it'd allow for possible physing attacks or even man in the middle attacks. Remember, all traffic on the internet can be seen by anyone in between you and the server hosting the service. If someone made a copy of that data, in 15 years time they could be able to decrypt it.
And no, I've never uploaded a photo of my ID to any bank, airline or gov agency. I've always done this stuff in person, and if a website asks for a photo of an ID, that's a big red flag for me.
But my biggest concern isn't even the security implications of it all. The internet has been working fine without those restrictions for more than 30 years. Why are they so important all of a sudden?
If children connecting and accessing porn websites is such a big problem, why don't we teach parents how to block them in their router? Instead of funding a company that verifies people's age, the governments could fund the creation of a constantly updated domain blocklist for those pages, and there would be no security or privacy implications.
The double verification idea sounds good on paper, but still has some of the privacy implications uploading your ID has. For starters, you can really easily be tracked along the net for advertising purposes, and you can't just change a TOR/VPN output node and vanish.
Then there's the hacking problem. How can you trust that the verification company will keep your data safe? LastPass (I believe it was called that) lost the passwords of thousands of people, and they're supposedly a really professional and secure company that is focused on storing passwords.
And that's without taking into account the fact that any government or 3 letter organization can just ask this company and easily know where you've been.
I would never trust any system that requires a unique ID to verify your age/existance, and I would never upload an ID, drivers license or anything similar to a company I don't know.
Pi-hole on a raspberry pi zero-2 W. The thing I like the most is that you can run it with unbound as an upstream DNS provider, so you can have your own private DNS at home without filtering your traffic to another DNS provider.
Now that seems more likely. Elon has a habit of creating problems and then attributing those problems to completely unrelated stuff so his followers think he's always right. I originally thought that the backend was starting to finally crumble after he fired more than 75% of the company's employees, so he had to limit the load on the system. But your explanation seems more logical.
This is the way. No fake download buttons in the process, no chrome or chrome based browsers involved.
Where can I learn his abilities?
First of all, migrants not only generate jobs, but they also work the jobs that most native people don't want. Most farms and construction works nowadays are occupied by inmigrants, because they don't steal your job, they take the ones that you didn't like.
Second of all, most countries are not populated to their fullest. There's a lot of space, both horizontal and vertical, and Europe can perfectly house the inmigrants that it gets. And if space is such a big problem, then you should look at why we are letting entities like banks and "governments" have lots (thousands) of empty houses.
A while ago a guy was punched to death for being gay by a group of people with the same political opinions as you. Does that mean that you should be immediately deprived of your human rights? You can not compare every single inmigrant to something that happened one day.
Wow, you've kinda described me in that post.
I'm not an expert and, like I said, I've been kinda lonely for most of my life. But I've come to find out some things that help me with social life.
The most important thing to do is just being yourself. After trying to analize the reason why social gatherings drain so much energy from me, I've found out that it's usually trying to be someone that I'm not what tires me the most. Trying to seem more social, trying to control my nerd impulse of overexplaining things that aren't relevant to the conversation, that kind of stuff.
Some people might find you awkward, but the truth is that if you need to "fake a personality" in order to be someone's friend, that person isn't really your friend.
The people that will actually stay with you and be friends with you will be the ones that like you as you are, and you can just be yourself with them. That usually drains a lot less social battery, and I've found that it's way easier for them to understand when you don't have the energy for meeting up.
Don't get me wrong, it's perfectly OK to have different "personalities", and I have some filters even with the people I've met like this. But it just seems to me the less filters and personalities you have to keep, the easier it is to keep up a social relationship with someone.
I'm sorry for any possible grammar mistake, I'm on a mobile phone and I don't have an autocorrect app. English is not my first language either, so I'm sorry for any weird expressions too.