Ofcom guidance: "service providers should not host or permit content on your service that directs or encourages child users to circumvent the age assurance process or the access controls, for example by providing information about, or links to, a virtual private network (VPN) which may be used by children to circumvent the relevant processes."
If you run a forum about technology, say, your #OnlineSafetyAct obligations include censoring discussions of VPNs, Tor or other privacy-preserving tech.
Whether a post that says "you shouldn't use Tor or VPNs to break through IP-based age-gating, but if you're a journalist visiting a dictatorial regime who is a bit concerned they might be spied on, you should totally look into ways to preserve your privacy" amounts to "directing" or "encouraging" circumvention of age assurance processes or access controls—despite explicitly discouraging it—is left as an exercise for the reader.
Genuinely one of the silliest pieces of legislation in my lifetime.
The real fun test case:
"It's ya boy SkeezyJay479, I'm totally not endorsing this VPN because it can let you look at pornography or set up an account on TikTok from the UK but because I'm paid to do so, duh, also like, subscribe and hit the little bell, now back to the AI slop—I mean, content..."
@tommorris Also nothing in the law says that talking about VPNs is banned, this is all Ofcom. Also the age assurance part is a mess.
@TheVampireFishQueen where the line is between legitimate exercise of delegated authority and overstepping of that legislative authority will be a matter for judicial review.
In cases brought by big tech companies rather than mastodon instances or little web forums about cycling etc., one assumes.
@tommorris Lets hope the ORG and others move fast.
@tommorris
So an end to nordvpn sponsorship in the UK then?
@tony Maybe—the individual YouTubers probably aren't "service providers", but YouTube/Google maybe are.
Individual podcasts may come within scope, but only if they have comments on their websites.
@tommorris One day in conversation at dinner my son mentioned that his school firewall could be bypassed by using a VPN, and“everyone knows how to do it”. He was 14. He is now 29. I fear the VPN cat has been out of the bag for a long time. “The OSA is an ass.”