The Supreme Court on June 27 upheld a Texas law requiring pornographic websites verify users are at least 18, in a case that pitted concerns about protecting minors against worries about violating the First Amendment rights of adults.

The court split 6-3 along ideologically grounds with the three liberal justices dissenting.

Eighteen other, largely conservative states have enacted similar laws in recent years as access toa growing cache of online pornography has exploded and the material has become more graphic.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[+] 78 points 1 year ago (16 children)
  • [–] 34 points 1 year ago (9 children)

    We're a ways off from that, simply because VPNs have too much business utility.

    But we're definitely moving in the direction of "Everyone who uses the internet has to show their ID first" as a means of tracking the bulk of retail web surfing.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 9 child comments
  • [–] 6 points 1 year ago (5 children)

    I mean, they get your social when you purchase service.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 5 child comments
  • [–] 5 points 1 year ago* (3 children)

    Not if you're just renting a server in a foreign country with different privacy laws and rolling your own VPN.

    Also some VPNs allow payment with cryptocurrency.

    Mullvad, for instance, accepts Monero, Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, and Bitcoin Lightning.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 3 child comments
  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago* (2 children)

    I meant Internet service. Cox or Comcast or Verizon or whoever.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    True, but if you use a VPN and don't use their DNS (and especially if you set up a recursive DNS server of your own) they have a lot less information about what you do online.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

    don't use their DNS

    As long as you use encrypted DNS, like DoH (DNS over HTTPS). Regular DNS is unencrypted, so the ISP can trivially collect data even if you use a custom recursive server (either your own or a public one like Cloudflare, Quad9, etc).

    Running a recursor on a VPS then querying it using DoH seems like a reasonable approach to me. I've got an AdGuard Home server on my home network that uses DoH for all upstream DNS queries, but I'm currently just using Quad9 rather than my own recursor.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago

    Easy: VPN license. Corporations already don't like when customers use VPNs to get around their geo locks on content. We're one lobbying push away from courts broadly interpreting use of a VPN as a malicious violation of DMCA or CFAA.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 16 points 1 year ago (5 children)

    Probably going to see an uprise in things like lorawan or consumer-owned mesh networks.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 5 child comments
  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    Most people can/t figure out how to change their password. Those technologies are going to have to get real easy real fast to get somewhere.

    I mean “one button” easy.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago (1 child)

    You used to have to connect to the internet with dial up and give up your phone line. And here we are today.

    The time will come.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago

    Yeah, those were the technically savvy groups. (They were by-and-large not technically savvy, but compared to the larger set of users they were.)

    The time will come as soon as someone makes it. Make all the choices for them, no options, one button. Go.

  • source
  • parent