The government writes in surprisingly hard hitting report. The Roadmap to Age Verification is a document produced by Australia's eSafety Commissioner. The
document includes the paragraph:
The Roadmap finds age assurance technologies are immature, and present privacy, security, implementation and enforcement risks
‘Age verification’
describes measures which could determine a person’s age to a high level of accuracy, such as by using official government identity documents. However, the Roadmap examines the use of broader ‘age assurance’ technologies which include measures that
perform ‘age estimation’ functions. The Roadmap notes action already underway by industry to introduce and improve age assurance and finds that the market for age assurance products is immature, but developing.
It is clear from
the Roadmap that at present, each type of age verification or age assurance technology comes with its own privacy, security, effectiveness and implementation issues.
For age assurance to be effective, it must:
• work reliably
without circumvention;
• be comprehensively implemented, including where pornography is hosted outside of Australia’s jurisdiction; and
• balance privacy and security, without introducing risks to the personal information of adults who choose to
access legal pornography.
Age assurance technologies cannot yet meet all these requirements. While industry is taking steps to further develop these technologies, the Roadmap finds that the age assurance market is, at this time,
immature.
The Roadmap makes clear that a decision to mandate age assurance is not ready to be taken.
