Tag: digital id

X’s Linda Yaccarino Backs Kids’ “Safety” Bill as Digital ID Privacy Fears Grow

As the legislative session nears its conclusion, X CEO Linda Yaccarino has announced her role in revising the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA), a move seemingly intended to sway hesitant Republican leaders in the House. But skeptics warn that the bill’s approach to protecting children online—through measures likely to lead to age verification—could come at the cost of privacy and online anonymity, leading to the broader adoption of digital ID systems.

Under KOSA, tech platforms would face a “duty of care” to prevent harm to minors, targeting features like infinite scroll and photo filters. While Senators Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) and Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) lauded the updates for “safeguarding free speech online and ensuring it is not used to stifle expression,” privacy advocates argue the bill’s underlying mechanisms remain problematic. They warn that fulfilling KOSA’s requirements could necessitate platforms to verify users’ ages, potentially by tying online activity to government-issued IDs—a move that threatens to erode online anonymity and jeopardize free expression.

While the bill itself does not mandate age verification, it requires a “duty of care” towards content shown to minors that could cause platforms to introduce age verification to avoid liability. Despite the updated text of the bill, it still contains a controversial provision that will likely ultimately pave the way for online age verification (by requiring the Secretary of Commerce, FTC, and FCC to study “options for developing systems to verify age at the device or operating system level”).

X owner Elon Musk has recently criticized Australia for trying to implement a similar bill so it’s unclear why Musk and Yaccarino aren’t aligned on the issue.

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Meta Pushes for a Digital ID Revolution

Meta is coming out as a supporter of age verification, and the proposal the giant is putting forward exposes and sums up many of the points critics have been consistently making.

A blog post by Meta VP and Global Head of Safety Antigone Davis proposes to implement age verification at the operating system/app stores level.

Although the narrative around child safety and difficulties of parenting “in the digital age” dominates the article, “the meat of it” are the implications that this approach brings with it: namely, it creates a situation where, down the line, people would be forced to link real-world identity to their phone’s operating system (OS).

And everything they do using the phone is exposed to that OS.

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The UN Is Using Africa as a Testing Ground for Controversial Digital ID Systems

The United Nations (but not only) has clearly chosen to focus its push on introducing digital ID systems to some of the world’s developing countries, particularly in Africa.

What’s referred to in reports as “a comprehensive initiative” is now taking place across the continent, driven by the UN development agency UNDP, as well as the UN Innovation Network, and even UNESCO (Education, Scientific, and Cultural Organization). This is one of the components of what’s known as the UN’s Global Digital Compact.

Such initiatives are sold in those countries as a way to develop better access to services and improve “digital inclusion.”

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UK government begins to implement digital IDs and tackle “misinformation” just like the UN wants it to

The following are summaries of articles published by Reclaim the Net over the last ten days, from 23 October to 13 November.  You can read the full article by following the hyperlink in the section title.

Table of Contents

  1. Ex-Facebook VP Joins UK Media Regulator Ofcom Sparking Fresh Conflict of Interest Concerns, 6 November 2024
  2. Tracking Health or Tracking You? The UK’s Expanding Health Surveillance, 23 October 2024
  3. UK Government Makes Major Digital ID Push, 3 November 2024
  4. UK Government To Test Digital ID on Veterans by 2025, Amid Plans for Wider Use, 13 November 2024
  5. UK Government Demands Regulator Create Social Media Overhaul to Curb “Misinformation,” Plans New Censorship Committee by 2025, 24 October 2024
  6. UN Wants Digital IDs To Combat “Hate Speech,” “Misinformation”, 7 November 2024

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UN Wants Digital IDs To Combat “Hate Speech,” “Misinformation”

A United Nations (UN) committee has adopted two resolutions, one of them aimed at the World Organization’s Department of Global Communications establishing and strengthening “partnerships with new and traditional media to address hate speech narratives.”

The Fourth Committee (Special Political and Decolonization) also adopted a resolution further promoting the UN’s “Our Common Agenda” plan, which, among other points, proposes bank account-linked digital ID – as well as the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), UN Pact for the Future, and Global Digital Compact – also pushing for digital IDs, censorship, and surveillance, with major countries as the schemes’ key backers.

Ahead of the adoption of the documents, representatives of a number of countries spoke in favor of expanded censorship under the UN umbrella, with Italy’s delegate advocating for the use of AI in combating “misinformation and disinformation.”

UK’s representative reiterated the country’s commitment to the UN Pact for the Future and Global Digital Compact, highlighted the far-reaching censorship law, Online Safety Act, and noted that it forces companies “to remove illegal online content, including illegal mis and disinformation generated by AI.”

Another thing the UK remains committed to, the address revealed, is digging its heels in when it comes to characterizing “misinformation” as a major threat.

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G20 Embraces Digital ID Dream While Critics Warn of Surveillance Nightmare

The G20 organization, currently chaired by Brazil and recently holding a ministerial meeting there, is wasting no time falling in line with all the key policies advanced by many governments, and globalist elites.

After promising to do its bit in the “war on disinformation” (to the delight of the host, Brazil, whose present government is accused of censorship), G20 member countries “pledged allegiance” to the digital ID and the overall scheme that incorporates it – namely, the digital public infrastructure (DPI).

Related: The 2024 Digital ID and Online Age Verification Agenda

DPI already counts the UN, the EU, the World Economic Forum (WEF), and the Gates Foundation as policy backers and vocal promoters. Now G20 ministers with digital economy portfolios have issued a joint declaration to express their “commitment” to both DPI and “combating disinformation”, and there is also inevitably the talk of “AI.”

On the digital ID/DPI front, the ministers speak of “inclusive” DPI, and the same attribute is attached to AI. The declaration “acknowledges” the importance of things like innovation and competition in a digital economy, among other things, at the same time “reaffirming” the importance of digital transformation based on DPI.

Boilerplate remarks are made about transparency and protection of privacy and personal data – but these are the major concerns cited by opponents of this type of scheme, along with the overall fear that they facilitate new, more dangerous forms of mass surveillance through centralization of personal information and tracking of people’s activities.

Referring to digital ID as “a basic DPI,” the declaration further speaks of the Sustainable Development Goals (a UN agenda) and one of its targets to be achieved by 2030 by using digital ID (as a tool of “inclusion”) to provide “legal identity for all.”

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Big Tech’s Latest “Fix” for AI Panic Is To Push a Digital ID Agenda

A research paper, authored by Microsoft, OpenAI, and a host of influential universities, proposes developing “personhood credentials” (PHCs).

It’s notable for the fact that the same companies that are developing and selling potentially “deceptive” AI models are now coming up with a fairly drastic “solution,” a form of digital ID.

The goal would be to prevent deception by identifying people creating content on the internet as “real” – as opposed to that generated by AI. And, the paper freely admits that privacy is not included.

Instead, there’s talk of “cryptographic authentication” that is also described as “pseudonymous” as PHCs are not supposed to publicly identify a person – unless, that is, the demand comes from law enforcement.

“Although PHCs prevent linking the credential across services, users should understand that their other online activities can still be tracked and potentially de-anonymized through existing methods,” said the paper’s authors.

Here we arrive at what could be the gist of the story – come up with workable digital ID available to the government, while on the surface preserving anonymity. And wrap it all in a package supposedly righting the very wrongs Microsoft and co. are creating through their lucrative “AI” products.

The paper treats online anonymity as the key “weapon” used by bad actors engaging in deceptive behavior. Microsoft product manager Shrey Jain suggested during an interview that while this was in the past acceptable for the sake of privacy and access to information – times have changed.

The reason is AI – or rather, AI panic, thriving these days well before the world ever gets to experience and deal with, true AI (AGI). But it’s good enough for the likes of Microsoft, OpenAI, and over 30 others (including Harvard, Oxford, MIT…) to suggest PHCs.

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Bill Gates Laments First Amendment Strength on “Misinformation,” Advocates For Digital ID

Microsoft Founder Bill Gates has voiced concerns about the intersection between technology and speech, particularly criticizing the limitations he perceives the First Amendment’s free speech protections impose on combating online “misinformation.”

Gates erroneously cited the example that shouting “fire” in a crowded theater is an exception to free speech protections, a misrepresentation that has been clarified legally over time to be more nuanced in its application.

The technology magnate is grappling with what he believes to be the threats of misinformation and the technological phenomena of deepfakes.

In his discussions, particularly highlighted in an upcoming Netflix series and through dialogue with Stanford experts, Gates advocates for digital IDs to verify online identities to help curb this “misinformation.”

The Gates Foundation has donated money to digital ID projects in the past, using parts of Africa as a testing ground.

Gates’ proposed approach ostensibly aims to curb the spread of fake content and ensure that only verified individuals can publish information which means that online content can be matched to real-life identities.

However, this raises significant concerns about privacy and the potential for excessive surveillance and control over digital spaces, something Gates has never been too keen to defend.

“The US is a tough one because we have the notion of the First Amendment and what are the exceptions like yelling ‘fire’ in a theater,” Gates explained, as reported by CNET.

Gates’ commentary on the First Amendment, using the flawed “fire in a theater” analogy suggests a readiness to dilute foundational free speech principles to implement digital solutions.

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Digital ID And You

As the United Nations gears up for its Summit of the Future, to be held in September during the 79th General Assembly, I am offering a series on Agenda 2030, the agenda that the Summit is intended to advance. One of the outcome documents that the member states will sign is the Global Digital Compact. And one of the major elements of that agreement is the establishment of digital identity for every single person on the planet.

You’ve probably read about digital identity but you may not know what the entirety of the project entails and signifies. And you may be contributing to your own digital identity without knowing it. For reasons that will become clear, this is not something that you want to do. Read to the end to find out how you can elude the clutches of this globalist, totalitarian surveillance system.

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Americans who refuse to sign up for “voluntary” government-issued digital ID may be DENIED health care services

Before his term ends, President Joe Biden is planning to sign an executive order (EO) to speed up the nation’s adoption of a standardized digital identification platform controlled by Washington, D.C.

The digital ID system will require Americans to verify their identity and age in order to access certain public websites and services. This includes Obamacare and other government-run health care plans that will only be available to Americans who agree to participate in the digital ID program.

A nonprofit media outfit called NOTUS obtained a draft copy of Biden’s EO, which states that “It is the policy of the executive branch to strongly encourage the use of digital identity documents.”

The program is “optional,” but in order to access health care services, renew one’s driver’s license, or log onto public services portals online, users will have to agree to participate otherwise they will not be allowed to access anything controlled by the government online.

According to NOTUS, Biden’s EO “could reshape how Americans access government services, and potentially behave online.” Biometric technologies like facial recognition are included as part of the system to “help better verify identity online,” we are told.

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