In this arena, more regulation is needed. Anonymous age verification is a good idea, but I question the actual anonymity. It usually depends on trust of some entity. And I just can’t fathom an entity that can really be trusted.
Foreign corporations are much more aggressive about harvesting data than the German government so you should think twice about using their products in the first place. Most of the time the German government is under fire for privacy concerns it’s because they trusted products from Microsoft or Huawei and the like.
It uses the government ID, which has a built in NFC chip. You can use a phone in combination with your ID and it’s pin to verify your age online. The ID scanner app will tell you which parameters the website requests from your ID, and its possible to only request the birthdate.
I don’t like the system, but it is truly anonymous
Sounds like it is only anonymous if you fully trust the app. That app has all your information, and the site you are trying to access. And I bet it is completely closed source. It also likely has logs about what sires it is giving information to. Not who’s info in that log. But elsewhere it probably has logs on who’s id it verified. Get access to both, and software can start to crunch the numbers and figure out who went where. That if course is assuming they don’t decide in the future that it is worth just keeping that data together in one spot.
There is just no entity that could manage that app which wouldn’t have a motive to use the data and power it has.
No, the app is completely open source and has reproducible builds. And the site you are accessing only gets the information it requested, and you see which information it requested in the app before scanning your ID
Now you are starting to sound like you know what your talking about. But I’m not convinced yet. So when the app sends just the requested data to the site, how does the site verify that the data is legit. A person could fork the app and hack it. I am sure they thought of this, I just don’t know what thier solution is. And I can’t read german.
As long as the part asking for ID trusts the part verifying the ID, there is no need for anonymity to be broken, since the verifier just has to confirm what the asking part needs to know.
Think of it like someone owns a bar and needs to know if a patron is old enough to drink, and the bar owners brother or best friend says “I know that guy, he is old enough”.
In this arena, more regulation is needed. Anonymous age verification is a good idea, but I question the actual anonymity. It usually depends on trust of some entity. And I just can’t fathom an entity that can really be trusted.
Well the entity is the government. You know, the guys who create your ID in the first place. It’s not perfect but it’s the best one I could conceive.
You can trust them to create the ID because it benefits them. But to guard you anonymity… that actually hurts them. So you can be sure they won’t.
Foreign corporations are much more aggressive about harvesting data than the German government so you should think twice about using their products in the first place. Most of the time the German government is under fire for privacy concerns it’s because they trusted products from Microsoft or Huawei and the like.
It uses the government ID, which has a built in NFC chip. You can use a phone in combination with your ID and it’s pin to verify your age online. The ID scanner app will tell you which parameters the website requests from your ID, and its possible to only request the birthdate.
I don’t like the system, but it is truly anonymous
Sounds like it is only anonymous if you fully trust the app. That app has all your information, and the site you are trying to access. And I bet it is completely closed source. It also likely has logs about what sires it is giving information to. Not who’s info in that log. But elsewhere it probably has logs on who’s id it verified. Get access to both, and software can start to crunch the numbers and figure out who went where. That if course is assuming they don’t decide in the future that it is worth just keeping that data together in one spot. There is just no entity that could manage that app which wouldn’t have a motive to use the data and power it has.
No, the app is completely open source and has reproducible builds. And the site you are accessing only gets the information it requested, and you see which information it requested in the app before scanning your ID
https://github.com/Governikus/AusweisApp
Now you are starting to sound like you know what your talking about. But I’m not convinced yet. So when the app sends just the requested data to the site, how does the site verify that the data is legit. A person could fork the app and hack it. I am sure they thought of this, I just don’t know what thier solution is. And I can’t read german.
(NotOP) these things will usually use cryptographic signatures and if the app has been altered, it’d fail the check.
No clue what they are specifically doing though.
This. ID and anonymity are antithetical
Not necessarily. As another user noted, zero-knowledge proofs might be able to be used to anonymously age-verify people, if done correctly.
If all the ID consists of, then no it’s not.
As long as the part asking for ID trusts the part verifying the ID, there is no need for anonymity to be broken, since the verifier just has to confirm what the asking part needs to know.
Think of it like someone owns a bar and needs to know if a patron is old enough to drink, and the bar owners brother or best friend says “I know that guy, he is old enough”.