https://www.techdirt.com/2026/02/25/hackers-expose-the-massive-surveillance-stack-hiding-inside-your-age-verification-check/

The EU is building the EUDI wallet (or rather requiring each member state to provide a solution) and it will be possible to prove your age with that without disclosing details about your identity. And it's even possible to do this on your device, so the state won't know who you're proving your age to. Just saying that there are ways to do it right. It's just a matter of whether everybody wants that.

I am pretty sure this lets google grab all of the metadata of the mobile phone

Android is a Google product. They have full control over it. They can "grab all the metadata of the mobile phone" (whatever that means) any time they like.

For many people, yes, I think it will lead to the end of anonymous accounts, but for many others, it will lead to innovation in bypassing age verification.

Wait, I have to set up burner accounts all the time for Red Team engagements and you can usually get a google account with SMS verification only. Are you sure you're doing it correctly? are you doing it from Tor or a VPN or an internet café?

Why would your country matter in the process for an internet account if you can use an IP from virtually anywhere?

All these tiny details matter for your OpSec, and every choice also affects how hard you trigger abuse prevention mechanisms from service providers.

Details aside, yes it is getting harder and its insane that you need actual professional skills to maintain privacy, where it should be the default.

Educate yourself and your loved ones on surveillance self-defense: https://ssd.eff.org/

Also, lmao at expecting privacy from anything Google.

Why use Google or any of the big US tech firms for burner accounts then?

google started limited the accounts created, allegedly to combat botting/spamming, and from AI SCRAPing. they have a deal for Reddits data to AI scrape, i think google is helping them out trying to force genuine users content, it pretty much conincides with reddits forced login. because botters and spammers create hundreds of google accounts to verify with reddit(as trustworthy to keep it from getting shadowbanned)

Google already has the imei of that old phone associated with you. Once you start using that phone online and they are tracking to, they'll be able to confirm it's you.

I set up burner accounts on proton.me. But anyway, you are right. Sadly enough, you only needed a reliable, standardized system that gives back if you are below or on and beyond a certain age threshold, but BigTech and their bootlickers already started to implement age verification with proprietary apps, exploiting every ID detail they get, and legally required BigTech accounts, services, and stores.