Most of my objections are enforcement - yes, other people have my ID, but they are generally large institutions that are held to account when they have data leaks. Data leaks in social media, especially smaller companies, are rife and I don't want them to contain everything someone needs for identity fraud. Video age recognition is not reliable and extremely discriminatory - I have a friend whose face never registers as a face, and it's especially unreliable between different teenagers. Teenagers are also less likely to even have any easily scannable ID, especially less well off teenagers.
On that last point, this feels a lot like yet another 'let's find a use case for mandatory ID cards' and nobody likes mandatory ID cards (tbh I am actually softer on this than most people I know, I only don't like the idea because of the incompetence with which it is likely to be executed).
Also, real names is actually pretty bad - there are a lot of reasons not to use your real name (not just trans reasons - eg you usually go by a nickname and noone will know who you are by your passport name, you are a teacher and don't want the kids you are responsible for to find you, you are in witness protection, you have a stalker, you don't want your employer or coworkers to know about your weird hobbies), people with 'weird' names are generally singled out for enforcement, it's hard to build up a personal brand if your name is too normal.
Here's a challenge for anyone who thinks ID cards are a bad idea. Find a single EU citizen (everyone knows a few) who can tell you a single story about any time in their life where having a government-issued ID card led to any outcome that was remotely less favourable to them than if there had not been government-issued ID cards.
That's it. One EU citizen, one incident, any time in their entire life.
It's interesting that across Europe, not a single political party, from the beyond-Corbynites on the far left to the beyond-Restore people on the far right, and including the extremely anti-surveillance Pirate parties, has the abolition of ID cards in its programme/manifesto.
I tried to explain to my Spanish neighbour (70 years old, resisted Franco, lifetime social democrat) that the UK has no ID cards. He was literally unable to understand how a society could function without them. When I told him that people imagine that there will be secret police on every corner demanding your papers he just laughed.
(As a nice by-product, identity theft of the type that plagues the UK and US is almost unheard of in EU countries...)
(my initial objections were 'the weird kids need social media to find each other' but an Australia style ban on posting style social media that leaves Discord servers alone is fine for that.)
I asked Google what pro-ana material was but instead of telling me it told me help was available, so I'm guessing it's something pretty bad! (Searching 'pro-ana meaning' allowed me to discover it's pro-anorexia material. Yeah, that sounds like something we could do without.)
Given that, despite your involvement with the horror show that was the last government, you generally seem fairly sensible, this article is a rather depressing illustration of why the last government was as it was.
While I think that the hysteria about social media is overblown, I can see a case for restricting it somewhat for children. (I also think a phone ban in schools could be a sensible thing to do.). While this proposal is presented by the press, and by you, as a ban on social media for children it's actually a requirement for all adults to prove their ID to use a fair chunk of the Internet. If you think that's a good idea then you lack a lot of imagination and/or recent historical knowledge.
Worse for this proposal is that it appears to be the latest in a long line of idiotic ideas rushed out by a failed prime minister in search of a "legacy". That alone should disqualify it from support from anyone who's lived through net zero, the generational smoking ban, etc etc.
It would limit the ability of people working in eg multinational companies to express any political opinion (even moderate one), especially about foreign policy or things affecting their own industry.
Eg if you are a senior City worker, it's quite risky and potentially forbidden by your employer to express opinions in public about eg financial industry regulation or the latest banking scandal.
When I first had a Twitter account, I posted under my real name, also about the hot debate topics relate to the industry I worked in. Nothing extremist or illegal. Very soon I have been made to know that my employer was monitoring what I said on Twitter. That of course put a stopper on how freely I was able to express myself.
Sorry, but I am not very convinced about some of these arguments:
- "Culture and legislation are mutually reinforcing."
That this is about sending a signal to parents that it's illegal to use social media is entirely your assumption - and a weird one, considering you open with data about the support for this legislation. If anything, at least in the word of the PM, the nudge is towards the industry - but then I don't understand how a ban that falls on users rather than regulating the companies themselves is useful in that sense. If anything, it leaves them off the hook to create more damaging content. If there is such a wide support, why not choosing to regulate the tech companies?
- "We already use ID and other invasive tech tools" - well, first of all, the fact that you choose to use it does not mean everyone does or is willing to do so. And an argument that does not distinguish between a choice and a government-mandated measure is very risky - and treats the (widely documented) risks and harms quite superficially
As an aside we leave so many breadcrumbs on social media through our searches and set up of our browser and typing quirks that the big sites like Meta and Google know our real identity, any burner accounts we additionally have as well as our age. They have a good idea of our present mood too.
A change I would be very keen on is for advertisers and ad bureaus to have to prove their identity and if there is a problem later the social media site on hook to pay the compensation. Evidence from when Google tightened up is that it eliminates nearly all fraud overnight. Structure in place to implement swiftly.
Your point 4, that presenting a curated feed makes the platform a publisher, is cogent. Has this idea been used in litigation before? It sounds promising as an argument.
Most of my objections are enforcement - yes, other people have my ID, but they are generally large institutions that are held to account when they have data leaks. Data leaks in social media, especially smaller companies, are rife and I don't want them to contain everything someone needs for identity fraud. Video age recognition is not reliable and extremely discriminatory - I have a friend whose face never registers as a face, and it's especially unreliable between different teenagers. Teenagers are also less likely to even have any easily scannable ID, especially less well off teenagers.
On that last point, this feels a lot like yet another 'let's find a use case for mandatory ID cards' and nobody likes mandatory ID cards (tbh I am actually softer on this than most people I know, I only don't like the idea because of the incompetence with which it is likely to be executed).
Also, real names is actually pretty bad - there are a lot of reasons not to use your real name (not just trans reasons - eg you usually go by a nickname and noone will know who you are by your passport name, you are a teacher and don't want the kids you are responsible for to find you, you are in witness protection, you have a stalker, you don't want your employer or coworkers to know about your weird hobbies), people with 'weird' names are generally singled out for enforcement, it's hard to build up a personal brand if your name is too normal.
Here's a challenge for anyone who thinks ID cards are a bad idea. Find a single EU citizen (everyone knows a few) who can tell you a single story about any time in their life where having a government-issued ID card led to any outcome that was remotely less favourable to them than if there had not been government-issued ID cards.
That's it. One EU citizen, one incident, any time in their entire life.
It's interesting that across Europe, not a single political party, from the beyond-Corbynites on the far left to the beyond-Restore people on the far right, and including the extremely anti-surveillance Pirate parties, has the abolition of ID cards in its programme/manifesto.
I tried to explain to my Spanish neighbour (70 years old, resisted Franco, lifetime social democrat) that the UK has no ID cards. He was literally unable to understand how a society could function without them. When I told him that people imagine that there will be secret police on every corner demanding your papers he just laughed.
(As a nice by-product, identity theft of the type that plagues the UK and US is almost unheard of in EU countries...)
(my initial objections were 'the weird kids need social media to find each other' but an Australia style ban on posting style social media that leaves Discord servers alone is fine for that.)
I asked Google what pro-ana material was but instead of telling me it told me help was available, so I'm guessing it's something pretty bad! (Searching 'pro-ana meaning' allowed me to discover it's pro-anorexia material. Yeah, that sounds like something we could do without.)
Given that, despite your involvement with the horror show that was the last government, you generally seem fairly sensible, this article is a rather depressing illustration of why the last government was as it was.
While I think that the hysteria about social media is overblown, I can see a case for restricting it somewhat for children. (I also think a phone ban in schools could be a sensible thing to do.). While this proposal is presented by the press, and by you, as a ban on social media for children it's actually a requirement for all adults to prove their ID to use a fair chunk of the Internet. If you think that's a good idea then you lack a lot of imagination and/or recent historical knowledge.
Worse for this proposal is that it appears to be the latest in a long line of idiotic ideas rushed out by a failed prime minister in search of a "legacy". That alone should disqualify it from support from anyone who's lived through net zero, the generational smoking ban, etc etc.
Additional point - if we did what was "tremendously popular" with the public then we'd still be in lock down...
"Require users to use real names."
It would limit the ability of people working in eg multinational companies to express any political opinion (even moderate one), especially about foreign policy or things affecting their own industry.
Eg if you are a senior City worker, it's quite risky and potentially forbidden by your employer to express opinions in public about eg financial industry regulation or the latest banking scandal.
When I first had a Twitter account, I posted under my real name, also about the hot debate topics relate to the industry I worked in. Nothing extremist or illegal. Very soon I have been made to know that my employer was monitoring what I said on Twitter. That of course put a stopper on how freely I was able to express myself.
Sorry, but I am not very convinced about some of these arguments:
- "Culture and legislation are mutually reinforcing."
That this is about sending a signal to parents that it's illegal to use social media is entirely your assumption - and a weird one, considering you open with data about the support for this legislation. If anything, at least in the word of the PM, the nudge is towards the industry - but then I don't understand how a ban that falls on users rather than regulating the companies themselves is useful in that sense. If anything, it leaves them off the hook to create more damaging content. If there is such a wide support, why not choosing to regulate the tech companies?
- "We already use ID and other invasive tech tools" - well, first of all, the fact that you choose to use it does not mean everyone does or is willing to do so. And an argument that does not distinguish between a choice and a government-mandated measure is very risky - and treats the (widely documented) risks and harms quite superficially
Jack *Dorsey*, not Dawsey. 🙏
As an aside we leave so many breadcrumbs on social media through our searches and set up of our browser and typing quirks that the big sites like Meta and Google know our real identity, any burner accounts we additionally have as well as our age. They have a good idea of our present mood too.
A change I would be very keen on is for advertisers and ad bureaus to have to prove their identity and if there is a problem later the social media site on hook to pay the compensation. Evidence from when Google tightened up is that it eliminates nearly all fraud overnight. Structure in place to implement swiftly.
Your point 4, that presenting a curated feed makes the platform a publisher, is cogent. Has this idea been used in litigation before? It sounds promising as an argument.