Age verification for R-rated games and websites raises privacy concerns
Some experts have said the new codes represented a big shift in how Australians used the internet. (Supplied: Pexels)
In short:
New online safety codes requiring R-rated games and websites to verify users' ages are now in effect.
The targeted services must manage verification and ensure they comply with Australia's privacy laws, or risk penalties of up to $49.5 million.
What's next?
Some experts have raised concerns about the privacy of Australians online amid previous age-verification data leaks.
Australia's new online safety codes requiring age verification for R-rated games and websites may compromise user privacy, experts say.
The comments follow the eSafety Commissioner's introduction of age restrictions for online content, including high-impact violence, pornography and self-harm material.
The new codes came into effect today and extend the measures put in place last year that saw under-16s banned from many social media platforms.
It will require search engines, social media platforms, pornography websites, app stores, gaming providers, and generative AI systems, including chatbots, to put in place steps to prevent children from being exposed to age-inappropriate content.
The targeted services will need to verify the age of adults, using systems they must manage themselves and that meet Australia's privacy laws.
Curtin University professor of internet studies Tama Leaver said the new codes represented a big shift in how Australians used the internet.
"I genuinely don't think most Australians were aware [that] … what is quite a significant change was coming,"he said.
"I think some level of age-gating and some sense of the internet marking the things that aren't intended for kids, especially, is a good thing.
"But I do suspect that when Australians over the age of 18 are asked to authenticate … I think they're going to resist."
What are in the new codes?
The new codes will require the websites and platforms to do the following:
- AI companion chatbots capable of generating sexually explicit, high-impact or self-harm material will need to confirm users are 18 or older before they can access it, either from the point of access or when the user logs onto the service.
- App stores will be required to take steps to prevent users who are under 18 from purchasing or downloading R18+ apps. They may also be required to confirm they are 18 or older through age assurance.
- Adult messaging services that specialise in the distribution of sexually explicit content or self-harm material may need to verify users' ages.
- Online gaming platforms will require users to complete some form of age assurance to access games classified R18+.
- Pornography websites and online services will be required to ask users to confirm their age.
- Search engines for users who are not logged in will blur search results containing pornography and high-impact violence by default. For searches related to suicide or disordered eating, the first result will be to a referral support service.
- Social media services that allow pornography or self-harm material must ensure its users are 18 or older. This may include age assurance when a user logs in or at the point of accessing the material.
What does the change mean?
eSafety Commissioner Julia Inman-Grant said the codes would protect children and young people from harmful content and shift responsibility for safety onto the platforms.
She said breaches may result in penalties of up to $49.5 million.
"We don't allow children to walk into bars or bottle shops, adult stores or casinos, but when it comes to online spaces where they are spending a lot of their time there are no such safeguards," Ms Inman Grant said.
"But that changes for Australian kids with these codes, which simply bring those same, commonsense protections we all grew up with to the online world of today.
"These industry-developed codes shift that responsibility back where it belongs — onto the companies designing these digital platforms and profiting from their users — and will give children back a little more of their childhoods."
Julie Inman Grant says if a young person searches for suicide or self-harm content, they will now see a helpline first. (Four Corners: Keana Naughton)
But Queensland University of Technology professor of digital communication Daniel Angus said there were privacy concerns about the new codes.
"What we're seeing is a fundamental erosion of the anonymous internet,"he said.
He added the concept of the internet being a space where users were not tracked and could freely access information was at risk.
"What we've seen over time, [is] the amount of private data that is able to be taken by largely commercial platforms," he said.
"But now we're seeing this kind of intervention by governments insisting on identity verification."
RMIT University associate dean of technology Dana McKay agreed there needed to be barriers that stopped underage people from accessing adult content.
But she said there were issues around data safety.
"One of the challenges with this age verification though, is how does it work and what happens to the information?" she said.
"Because when we go into a bottle store or buy cigarettes, we flash our ID. The store doesn't photocopy it and keep it forever."
Shift needed in how data is protected online, experts say
There is a balance to be struck between ensuring online safety for children and protecting people's privacy, according to Professor Leaver.
He said the new codes represented an increased appetite for age verification.
"How [do] we balance the need to try and make the internet a safer place for especially children with respecting people's privacy?" he said.
"That's a balance that is going to take some while to get right.
"I do think there's the potential to get it quite wrong in the short-term."
Data security around online age verification has been an issue in the past.
Last year Discord, an instant messaging and social media app, said about 70,000 users' government ID photos may have been leaked in a hack.
But Dr McKay said platforms did not need to retain information gathered during the age verification process.
"It's technically very easy to grab that stuff and then throw it away. Whether that's actually what will happen is a separate question,"she said.
Professor Angus said there needed to be a greater focus on protecting the privacy of Australians online.
"We are long overdue the conversation in terms of how we enshrine fundamental principles about the ways in which … internet services can take our data and what they do with that data," he said.
He said that regulations for data collection and minimising its use should have been a starting point.
"Yet what we're seeing is a further entrenchment of [the] absolute fundamental requirement now for users to hand over more of that data," Professor Angus said.
"Whether it's third-party age-assurance providers or age verifiers or it's the platforms and the service providers themselves."