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> the Aus Govt will be able to access citizen social media data with relative ease. So no more pseudo anonymous accounts

This isn't necessarily true.

It came as a surprise to me, but many "Government Digital ID" systems use Verifiable Credentials[1][2] and Decentralized Identifiers[3].

I live in BC, Canada. I have installed the BC Wallet app[4] which is open source code[5].

With the BC Wallet app, I can create an account using my BC drivers license.

Then I can interact with any third-party app that uses the BC Wallet as an authentication system. If the only thing this app wants to do is confirm my age, it can ask me to reveal my age. I reveal my age (the only piece of data I am choosing to reveal), and the app now knows and can trust (as long as it trusts the BC Wallet) that this is my age.

And the BC Wallet app servers/government never know when I am using the BC Wallet app.

Turns out the future may not be as dystopian as we once thought it may be.

EDIT:

I see now from the article the following:

> Social media companies also won't be able to force users to provide government identification, including the Digital ID, to assess their age.

What could have been privacy preserving seems like it won't be.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verifiable_credentials [2] https://www.w3.org/TR/vc-overview/ [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decentralized_identifier [4] https://digital.gov.bc.ca/digital-trust/digital-credentials/... [5] https://github.com/bcgov/bc-wallet-mobile

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idunnoman1222 a day ago | parent | next [-]

Proving identity is a hard problem. What’s to stop a kid from grabbing his father’s drivers license and setting up this wallet because eg his father is never going to do it

Secondarily what’s to stop an 18-year-old having hundreds of tiktok accounts and selling them for a dollar to whatever kid wants at is high school

every social media site is going to have to implement Australia’s 2fa system?

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sprice a day ago | parent | next [-]

This seems like a different and fraudulent category of problem.

The point is that it's possible to create third-party authentication systems that require proving your age and the only extra thing the third-party learns is a verifiable age and the government does not get any information at all.

All this being said, I took a look at the article in question and saw this:

> Social media companies also won't be able to force users to provide government identification, including the Digital ID, to assess their age.

So what could have been achieved with no invasion or privacy now seems like it must be achieved with an invasion of privacy.

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interactivecode a day ago | parent | prev [-]

aside from limitations like, you can only setup 1 app, or things like 2f authentication. Usually things like this are stopped by laws and enforcement causing consequences. I'm pretty sure that sort of thing would be considered identity theft. same thing as stealing their father's drivers license and opening bank accounts in their name.

There are physical barriers and there are barriers that are enforced manually. Same with speeding. you are not allowed to drive faster than 60. even though your car can drive faster, laws in combination with police, traffic cams and speed traps will make sure it's enforced.

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idunnoman1222 a day ago | parent [-]

I don’t get it so you’re gonna do what to a 15-year-old who is an ‘identity thief’ so that he can go on TikTok? What’s the punishment please?

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D-Coder 6 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Cancel all his accounts and delete all his postings... _without_ a backup.

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lstodd a day ago | parent | prev [-]

Put them in chains and onto a stinky sail vessel enroute to Australia... oh wait

	▲	worthless-trash 13 hours ago \| parent [-]
		The modern equivalent would be to repost all their last year tictocs, again.

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raxxorraxor 13 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

It will never be privacy preserving. Once established and users a hooked up to the service, they mandate further data sharing. Poof.