Yep, I'm not against proper age checking as long as it's developed carefully with a secure/private by design mentality, but this government's self-imposed deadline and focus on ticking political boxes will effectively put consumer choice and privacy far below the interests of tech companies and age assurance industry investors. It's looking like a familiar story - outsourcing responsibility for the practical implementation to questionable interests and promising "industry standards" and "safeguards" to protect consumers which are then poorly enforced or not practical to enforce. That'll replicate the fundamental shortcomings of our privacy regulation more broadly which have made poor policies/practices and data breaches so routine.