Starmer's vision quest

[Stevo 666]

You are struggling to pay an extra 5% tax on income of over £125k a year? Are you yanking our chains?

The only struggling I see is you struggling to read my posts properly.

 

[the snail]

Bold words from Starmer.

Tech firms have three months to stop children seeing or sending explicit content, Starmer says​

If they don't do it, he's going to introduce new laws...

which they will ignore because they are not based in the UK and our laws don't apply to them.

If they don't comply they can be fined,and if they don't pay the fines their services can be blocked. Easier to do if we are acting together with the EU.

 

[Bromptonaut]

which they will ignore because they are not based in the UK and our laws don't apply to them.

I think you'll find that, like porn since age verification came in, they'll follow the law or be blocked by ISPs.

 

[icowden]

I think you'll find that, like porn since age verification came in, they'll follow the law or be blocked by ISPs.

Which will just be immediately circumvented by VPNs

 

[icowden]

If they don't comply they can be fined,and if they don't pay the fines their services can be blocked. Easier to do if we are acting together with the EU.

People will just use their services via VPN and the fines will be ignored.

 

[Pblakeney]

But why preach to people who not only defiantly will never been converted (that's why most of them are on X, because they positively like the skewed environment that Musk provides), but more destructively, by swimming in that environment causes you to accept – albeit unwillingly and unconsciously – the framing of debates by the likes of Musk and Farage? It's why Labour – against all evidence that their votes haven't been leaching to Reform, but rather to the Greens – have been so intent on courting the far-right votes with their anti-immigrant rhetoric.

Equally importantly, their widespread usage of X is helping to sustain Musk's openly hostile messaging via X. If you can't imagine Churchill (or Chamberlain) paying the Nazis to publish pro-UK pieces in their 'newspaper' Völkischer Beobachter, as that would have been utterly ridiculous, why is the UK government paying to publish on X? It's sustaining a business that is actively hostile to just about every value that has helped us not descend into tyranny.

Very well put.
I don't know why they don't follow my lead and ignore X. You can be aware of what is happening without subsidising the misogynist racist.

 

[midlandsgrimpeur]

But why preach to people who not only defiantly will never been converted (that's why most of them are on X, because they positively like the skewed environment that Musk provides), but more destructively, by swimming in that environment causes you to accept – albeit unwillingly and unconsciously – the framing of debates by the likes of Musk and Farage? It's why Labour – against all evidence that their votes haven't been leaching to Reform, but rather to the Greens – have been so intent on courting the far-right votes with their anti-immigrant rhetoric.

Equally importantly, their widespread usage of X is helping to sustain Musk's openly hostile messaging via X. If you can't imagine Churchill (or Chamberlain) paying the Nazis to publish pro-UK pieces in their 'newspaper' Völkischer Beobachter, as that would have been utterly ridiculous, why is the UK government paying to publish on X? It's sustaining a business that is actively hostile to just about every value that has helped us not descend into tyranny.

I can only assume a part of it is the Westminster bubble, and perhaps the same malaise that the BBC is suffering from. Both seem disproportionately affected by this liberal(ish) fear of being perceived as being divorced from the reality of 'real' peoples lives. The govt. seem so caught up in the idea that X is where mainstream public opinion is actually focussed that they can't see the truth. The same way that the BBC seem obsessed with giving so much time to Farage and Reform in the interests of 'balance'. They appear fixated with the idea that they are now serving the majority of the population's political views and that also they can't be critical as they are then just living up to some mythical biased/patronising liberal left agenda perception.

 

[briantrumpet]

I can only assume a part of it is the Westminster bubble, and perhaps the same malaise that the BBC is suffering from. Both seem disproportionately affected by this liberal(ish) fear of being perceived as being divorced from the reality of 'real' peoples lives. The govt. seem so caught up in the idea that X is where mainstream public opinion is actually focussed that they can't see the truth. The same way that the BBC seem obsessed with giving so much time to Farage and Reform in the interests of 'balance'. They appear fixated with the idea that they are now serving the majority of the population's political views and that also they can't be critical as they are then just living up to some mythical biased/patronising liberal left agenda perception.

Exactly this.

 

[Bromptonaut]

Which will just be immediately circumvented by VPNs

The porn certainly was. I suspect an under 16 ban will fail for the same reason.

The stopping nude pics thing may be different. It was discussed at length on Times Radio yesterday with Jess Phillips who seems to have a solid understanding of the issue. The tool to stop it is at device level and may already be there on some Apple kit.

 

[Psamathe]

Bold words from Starmer.

Tech firms have three months to stop children seeing or sending explicit content, Starmer says​

If they don't do it, he's going to introduce new laws...

which they will ignore because they are not based in the UK and our laws don't apply to them.

Starmer will go for the least invasive (and thus lowest protection) so that when the Social Media billionaries ignore them it's "only a minor violation".

And in 3 months Starmer will start another consultation after which vague laws will be passed to OFCOM for conversion into regulations. OFCOM will take 1-2 years negotiating and consulting with the Social Media companies after which regulations will be specified and the Social Media Companies with have 12+ months to implement ... by which time Social Media will be irrelevant and it'll be AI LLMs that are causing the issues so "back to square one" ... and with Starmer continually spouting "We introduced regulations to protect children from Social Media companies" (all be that they were far too late, totally ineffective but worked politically)

 

[Psamathe]

I think you'll find that, like porn since age verification came in, they'll follow the law or be blocked by ISPs.

Which will just be immediately circumvented by VPNs

The VPN "loophole" is not a loophole in that it can easily be "closed". All the regulations have to require is that any access that is from behind any CGNAT requires the accessing system allow access to it's geolocation. So if masking or spoofing location through proxy/VPN (behind CGNAT) the site either gets geolocation (through browser or app) or blocks access.

Detecting access through a CGNAT is easy.

Once site knows country user is geographically in enforcing regulations is easy.

Several other ways to close proxied access.

 

[PurplePenguin]

The VPN "loophole" is not a loophole in that it can easily be "closed". All the regulations have to require is that any access that is from behind any CGNAT requires the accessing system allow access to it's geolocation. So if masking or spoofing location through proxy/VPN (behind CGNAT) the site either gets geolocation (through browser or app) or blocks access.

Detecting access through a CGNAT is easy.

Once site knows country user is geographically in enforcing regulations is easy.

Several other ways to close proxied access.

Websites that currently actively try to block VPNs (e.g. BBC) are not that successful, so I don't see how legislation will mean that a website with little interest in blocking them will be any better.

 

[Psamathe]

Websites that currently actively try to block VPNs (e.g. BBC) are not that successful, so I don't see how legislation will mean that a website with little interest in blocking them will be any better.

They don't use the CGNAT method but I believe tables of VPN servers. And they are good enough to catch the mainstream providers.

The CGNAT method will be more restrictive and will also catch some non-VPN providers. Given the shortage of IPv4 addresses some newer more specialist ISPs are using CGNATs for IPv4 sharing eg Gigaclear.

CGNAT is a dynamic method and would only be used to decide if geolocating the client is necessary ie because the IP is outside the UK or not geolocating. So app requires to get client location through browser/app to decide what regulations might be needed.

There are other automated methods, some particularly well suited to the UK eg compare timezone of IP against timezone of client computer.

Large social media companies have a massive advantage in detecting VPNs (over even the BBC) as they can automate watching logins and detect multiple (different) logins from the same shared IP which means VPN/CGNAT. They can automate creating their own VPN IP address tables.

Even using a private proxy for the purposes of masking location would still give itself away through multiple different logins from the same IP.

A lot of sites do this already eg most using VPNs will cone across Cloudflare's "Verify you are a human" "Security check". Google does similar based on similar automated IP monitoring.

Such checks are just for the apps/browser to establish country of client (rather than country of IP) and thus whether app/client needs geolocation location from phone/laptop rather than IP. All automated and all so fast user won't notice.

Regulation could specify steps Social Media must take to properly establish whether the client is located within UK jurisdiction. eg "where the accessing IP is through any proxy/CGNAT/IP Sharing system the server must use geolocation of the client through the client device to establish if UK regulation applies".

 

[PurplePenguin]

They don't use the CGNAT method but I believe tables of VPN servers. And they are good enough to catch the mainstream providers.

The CGNAT method will be more restrictive and will also catch some non-VPN providers. Given the shortage of IPv4 addresses some newer more specialist ISPs are using CGNATs for IPv4 sharing eg Gigaclear.

CGNAT is a dynamic method and would only be used to decide if geolocating the client is necessary ie because the IP is outside the UK or not geolocating. So app requires to get client location through browser/app to decide what regulations might be needed.

There are other automated methods, some particularly well suited to the UK eg compare timezone of IP against timezone of client computer.

Large social media companies have a massive advantage in detecting VPNs (over even the BBC) as they can automate watching logins and detect multiple (different) logins from the same shared IP which means VPN/CGNAT. They can automate creating their own VPN IP address tables.

Even using a private proxy for the purposes of masking location would still give itself away through multiple different logins from the same IP.

A lot of sites do this already eg most using VPNs will cone across Cloudflare's "Verify you are a human" "Security check". Google does similar based on similar automated IP monitoring.

Such checks are just for the apps/browser to establish country of client (rather than country of IP) and thus whether app/client needs geolocation location from phone/laptop rather than IP. All automated and all so fast user won't notice.

Regulation could specify steps Social Media must take to properly establish whether the client is located within UK jurisdiction. eg "where the accessing IP is through any proxy/CGNAT/IP Sharing system the server must use geolocation of the client through the client device to establish if UK regulation applies".

I suspected there was reason this wasn't done. When you say "catch some non-VPN providers", do you mean all mobile users and quite a few other ISPs as well? In other words millions of people.

There was one app I used to use which insisted on location access for geo-restricted content, but it dropped it. Presumably it wasn't popular.

Also, I think it is fairly easy to spoof device level location, so having annoyed millions of people, it wouldn't actually work for those who put a bit of effort in.

 

[Psamathe]

Also, I think it is fairly easy to spoof device level location, so having annoyed millions of people, it wouldn't actually work for those who put a bit of effort in.

Depends on the device. But it's not an annoyance as:
1. It need only apply on registration/once off verification ie user ID associated with country so logon from anywhere and country associated with registration regulations apply.

2.Lots of constraints already apply without annoying people eg I run ad blockers and quite a few sites refuse to give out content due to adblocker - I'm not paying so fair enough if a free content provider choses that model.

3. Using proxy/VPN/CGNAT/shared IP detection, then such good geolocation spoofing to match the proxy server IP would be beyond most of the smartest kids. Add that most (not all) VPNs allow user to select country not location within country so geo matching gets harder.

4. It all becomes much more platform dependent eg iPhone/iPad would be all but a non-starter.

5. With anything there are ways to get round it but harder it is made fewer will be able to do it. Closing the VPN option off blocks the bypass that many would be capable of doing.