“The SCOPE Act takes effect this Sunday, Sept. 1, and will require everyone to verify their age for social media.”
So how does this work with Lemmy? Is anyone in Texas just banned, is there some sort of third party ID service lined up…for every instance, lol.
But seriously, how does Lemmy (or the fediverse as a whole) comply? Is there some way it just doesn’t need to?
Why should it affect LW or any other (non-Texan) instance? Any rogue country with populists at the head can implement any arbitrary legislation. That does not affect Lemmy instances hosted in countries with reasonable governments. If Texas wants to enforce their rules (or punish for non-compliance), it is on them to approach instance admins or block the site in their corner of the global internet.
This is a fair view. I’m not sure anyone has gotten that far, especially outside the country.
Heres an article about a similar bill in Utah, that hasn’t gone into effect yet.
What’s not clear from the Utah bill and others is how the states plan to enforce the new regulations.
I mean if the general consensus is that it doesn’t apply, then, cool.
I live in Texas, and can confidently tell you the people writing these laws have no fundamental concept of what the internet is or how to implement or enforce such a law for consistent adherence.
I can also tell you with confidence this law will be wielded with impunity against specific companies/sites our corrupt, petulant AG decides to go after. Fuck Ken Paxton.
As far as users in Texas, this is nothing a VPN can’t fix.
They think it’s a big truck that you can just dump something on
That was Alaska
Is there a way to put a VPN on the router, so that all devices are covered?
Absolutely. Most “travel routers” have openvpn installed on them. I have one router set up with my normal internet, and another with a full time vpn’d connection. The VPN router was like $60.
They’re also great to have when traveling. It connects to whatever random wifi, and all of your devices show up as a single device. You turn off the VPN to connect to your hotel’s capture portal, then turn it back on and all of your devices have secure internet.
That’s an amazing idea. I had no clue this was a thing. I would imagine openvpn is free?
Is there a particular VPN router that you suggest?
Also, is there a subscription fee or something for the VPN usage?
Thank you so much for the info!
Find OpenWRT compatible routers
I’m using the gl.Inet 1200 off Amazon.
There is a monthly fee for your VPN account. I use nordvpn, but there are a ton of options depending on how much you want to pay and what you need.
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That would require jurisdiction to charge them anyways. They do not have such power.
jurisdiction and extradition. theyre too busy suppressing voting and melting their elderly.
Interstate commerce is not under the jurisdiction of any state, it’s under the jurisdiction of the federal government. They’d need a federal bill passed.
isn’t this exactly what happened with porn sites?
Look where it’s hosted? Sorry, but this approach has been outdated for decades. Laws apply when you address the users inside that legislation. No matter where you are, where your server is, etc.
Do you have examples of that? From what I’ve seen the laws only apply if a business has a physical presence in that state or country.
Everywhere…
Today here: https://sh.itjust.works/post/24478719
And like the top level comment stated, it’s on Brazil to block Twitter in their corner of the internet. That’s why their 20,000 ISPs are scrambling to block it - not Twitter
Is there any Lemmy hosted in the US? Texas can put on a stunt against any US instance, but don’t see them even trying for anything from the rest of the world. Too much work/money with too little chance of success.
And the state I’m in would tell them to fuck right off and would probably allow me to counter sue Texas into the ground for harassment. I don’t think Texas wants to mess with states that have massive GDPs and contribute lots of money to the federal government.
The answer? Block Texas
Not joking. If suddenly hundreds or thousands of sites would become unavailable. It wouldn’t last a week
That didn’t work with porn, so it’s not a good idea for less popular websites.
Honestly only a couple of the big porn sites, of it hit more big things it’d cause more uproar, imagine if Facebook went down for a day
doesnt that happen every time it rains in texas?
I’m so glad I don’t live in that shithole state.
They can SCOPE deez nuts.
That’s right, get noSCOPEd
Set up a redirect for all Texas IP addresses. Point to Fuck Texas.
It’s called the “Fuck Texas” response to such a garbage law. And good luck enforcing it especially with federated sites.
So much freedom that it hurts.
If you don’t operate in Texas, do you have you comply? Is the easy fix is don’t have your servers be in Texas?
Someone can correct me if im wrong, but, pretty sure its any social media. Similar to what happened with pornhub.
According to the Texas Office of the Attorney General, this new law will primarily “apply to digital services that provide an online platform for social interaction between users that: (1) allow users to create a public or semi-public profile to use the service, and (2) allow users to create or post content that can be viewed by other users of the service. This includes digital services such as message boards, chat rooms, video channels, or a main feed that presents users content created and posted by other users.”
I mean my question was addressing the scope of the jurisdiction Texas can have over a server in another state. It feels like the onus is on them (or the ISPs in Texas) to block that server
Maybe someone is better equip to answer this question. As far as I understand, it is up to the social media company, as it is operating in the state. Sort of the way the corporate office of a national grocery store can be sued.
https://www.texaspolicy.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/2023-05-BillAnalysis-HB18-Updated.pdf
First, it prohibits digital service providers from entering into an agreement with a known minor unless they have verifiable parental consent.
It seems its up to whomever is registering the account. If the person is under 18 they see a scrubbed version, of the person is over 18 they have full access. I’m not sure an ISP has control like that. I could be wrong.
I know with pornhub, the ISP didn’t block the site, pornhub itself did.
“Operating in the state” and “accessible in the state” are different.
Much like a business doesn’t have to have a specific state’s business license to sell to customers of a different state, a website does not have to comply with all laws everywhere just because the laws exist. If they’re operating in Texas, they will. If they’re accessible from Texas, that’s Texas’ problem.
Pretty sure it doesn’t work that way. Look at what happened to Binance; not a US website, not technically allowing US customers, still successfully prosecuted by the US government for not doing enough to prevent people in the US from using it.
That’s because they were facilitating actual, across-the-board federal crimes.
Not looking at titties.
I could see states that have such draconian laws working together to attempt to do anything about flagrant violators, but otherwise Texas has yet another pointless, toothless virtue signaling “law” on their hands.
The difference between what the laws are trying to enforce is a different issue though. The point is a website can be prosecuted just for being accessible when what it offers is against local laws.
lol it doesn’t
Texass is gonna have to play whack-a-mole and do it the hard way. And I’m pretty sure the more technically inclined members of the fediverse are going to have loads of fun fucking with whatever IT measures they try to mitigate this with, because they’re certainly not going to be drawing the best and brightest minds.
Put another way: weaponized non-neurotypicals are gonna have some fun fucking with a state government that doesnt like them, because the feeling is very much mutual.
I’m fine with Texas disappearing from the internet. Literally every site with a comment section now has to comply or just block Texas. One of those seems more feasible.
Texas is slowly turning into Afghanistan
Not so slowly. 20 years ago it was a battleground state.
Comply?
“Is there some way it just doesn’t need to” = “Is there some scenario in which Texas laws don’t apply worldwide?”
Yes. There is.
I expect the usage of VPNs in Texas to skyrocket exponentially in the next couple of months.
Don’t think so
I’m petty sure everyone already started using VPNs when Pornhub was banned
welp no more lemmy for texas i guess, lmao
Social media is probably a very poorly or very narrowly defined term. Either they called out Facebook, Reddit, Snapchat, etc by name or they gave some broad description of social media that could apply to everything from Facebook all the way down to somebody’s Vbulletin forum and this will be unenforceable for the vast majority of websites. Compliance is likely voluntary for the little fish in social media. I imagine that they aren’t even aware that Lemmy exists.
