All of you posting about verifying Adults

Just thought I would mention this, as I have read lots of posts about people wanting Lindon Labs to ask for Credit/Debit card information in order to ensure that those signing up to the main grid are Adults.

I don't know about the USA, but I assume it is the same as here in the UK, where you can get a student account with a debit card from age 11. My son has had one for 4 years, uses it in shops and online and last year subscribed to WOW and to create a Paypal account.

Doesn't this make the calls for CC/DC/Paypal to verify adult status rather meaningless? An 11 year old could sign up today for a premium account with payment info.

http://www.natwest.com/personal02.asp?id=PERSONAL/SAVE_AND_INVEST/SAVINGS_ACCOUNTS/UNDER_16/CARD_PLUS

The only sure way that LL could verify someone is an adult would be with Voters/Electoral Rolls from the UK and other countries and Social Security Number in the USA. I'm not sure that this would even be possible but I suspect that when the doodah hits the fan and the press make an issue of what underage kids get up to in SL then LL will be forced to adopt a measure such as this.

I would be interested to hear others comment on this.

Then we would get an even more uncontrolable system. For many countries have many different systems like that. Even The Netherlands use an other system then the UK... and we are kinda neighbors. Same can be said for most European countries... Don't even want to mention Asian/African/South American countries.
I think it will not be possible for Linden to use all these systems.

Apart from that something else is here to be mentioned. My credit card is insured against miss use of it.

It is not that I don't trust Linden, but I don't want them to have my SOFI-number (Dutch social security number). The links to things as my financial situation, taxes, health and alike is way too short to spread this number around. And specially with the identity theft that happens a lot these days, it is more important to be careful to it.

Too that, in my opinion a 14 year old is still under full responcibilty of his/her parents. And they have a task to keep an eye of what they do or not. I see too often that parents don't even care what a child does behind the computer... until something happens...

Edit: I mention an 14 year old as example, because you mentioned one. I don't mean him specially. But even my own 17 year has not free hand on the computer. She has a special log in, with limited rights... some limits even on her request. She is not interested into running certain sites by accident. Other limits are against spyware and alike. And when she needs a program to be installed we let it rather be done by someone who knows what she is doing. I don't do that myself either. We have an experienced friend to do things like that for us.

Morwen.

Yes, a lot of us want Verification back.

No, we do not call for CC/PayPal to be that method. It didn't work in the past, and won't now.

What we are asking LL to do is to look into other means of Verification that work for all, no matter what country they are in. A daunting task, but one that needs to be done.

You are correct in that under 18 persons may wind up using this new Verification. They did with CC info when that was used. That's not the point. The point is to have accounts accountable. With the system as it is, anyone can break the rules and come back in less than five minutes with a new accoutn to start all over again.

We are asking LL to make it harder for griefers, hackers, and troublemakers to do so.

~Jessy

Oh, don't get me wrong. I want verification back too. My account is verified too.

But on the other side I want my privacy protected too. So I am against a system through a Social Security number. It is connected to many very private things and can be mis-used in very bad ways.

My credit card company knows my birthday. Can that not be used somehow when we want to shut out those below 18 on the sdult grid? (I have no idea about legal issues involved with this).

And I think too that verified account already shuts out an lot of troublemakers and alike.

Morwen.

Jessy, I agree that it would be good to have verification back in order for LL to have some traceability for purposes of dealing with griefers, hackers etc, but I see this as a separate issue to that of age verification.

What I have noticed is that a I have seen a lot of posts where people are concerned that children may be taking part in adult activities and that they may in fact themselves be unwittingly taking part in activities with a minor.

They are then calling for payment verification to make themselves more comfortable that they are dealing with adults. In my original post I showed how children as young as 11 could easily obtain Premium accounts with Payment Verification status.

I also fully agree with Morwen that parents *should* take responsibility for their children's on-line activity, however I am aware that many (most?) won't, so that does nothing to make adults more comfortable that they are dealing with another adult.

My concern, and the reason for starting the thread, is that as SL gets more exposure in the media, one of the tabloid press in this country is sure to run a story soon along the lines of "My teen took part in online orgy" or "Children paid for sex in online paedophile world".

I know that here in the UK once one paper runs something like that then the next day, sensing a good internet story all the others will have it on the front page, closely followed by TV and questions in Parliament. Although we are but a small remote island from the US this could still put a large amount of pressure on LL to do something about it, even more so if the call is taken up by US media. Ultimately the only immediate response that I can see would be taking the grid down until safety measures could be put in place.

Which brings me back to the point of my original post, in order to preempt this (potentially) happening does anyone have any ideas what could be done?

Or am I just being a paranoid prophet of doom?

Anna

I don't know.

But over here we had some time ago an incident about a young girl that got involved with an older person on MSN. Some media tried to blow it up, but it was related back to responcibility of the parents to controle and guide their daughter on the Internet.

Well, I think one thing speaks for Linden in this. Their rules about the adult grid are very clear: It is 18+... no exception. You have to enter an age. If a teen cheats on that, it is not Lindens fault... I think?

Morwen.

Works great overseas, but unfortunately, America is the land of the lawsuit happy, and sometimes those cases which should be thrown out of court win. It all depends on the judge and whether that judge thinks the internet is the evil or a tool.

*sigh* My 4 year old has his own computer and it does connect to the internet, through our network. It is in the living room, along with my computer and my husband's. It has a password that only my husband and I can enter for him and he is restricted to those sites that are for his age range. I can see everything he does on his comp, either via my computer or just looking over at it. He plays games, which we install. He doesn't have a chat program (he doesn't read too well yet, anyways) and he won't until he's old enough to understand the safety rules. And even then, Mommy will be watching like a hawk. It's like watching the shows your kid watches.. only you have to be a bit more dilligent.

Too bad more parents don't actually think like this. And they won't until someone gets hurt and then they won't blame themselves, they'll sue the company that 'allowed' it to happen in the first place.

Unfortunately, I can't think of a single way to properly verify age that a script kiddie (an actual kid in this case) can't work their way around. I am pretty sure that requiring a person to enter their age isn't considered 'proactive' for the law, which will be the whole of the defense. At least with a CC, it is considered to be enough.

OK, I made the original post, so I'll propose a method of verification which would work but I'm sure that not many will like it

I'm in the UK but I'm sure the same thing would apply to other countries including the USA.

I'm working in the Credit Card business in the UK and I have details of accessing the credit reference agencies Experion and Equifax. One of the calls that can be made is for an Identity Check only using Name, Address and DOB. It will return an indicator showing if someone is over 18 or not. This will work for most people, however it is possible that an unverifiable status can be returned in which case further calls of increasing depth can be made (I can't go into details) to obtain a positive verification in almost all cases. This is all automated and does not leave a credit check footprint.

Positives:

A positive verification of age without requirement of payment information.

Negatives:

The Civil Rights Brigade would be up in arms (even though this goes on all the time for other reasons)
Cost - each bureau pull is charged - LL would probably have to subcontract the non-US checks to specialist companies in each country which would mean further cost, although it can all be automated.
A few people may drop through the system, further manual authentication may be required for these i.e. requesting a Social Security/Driving Licence/Telephone Number.

I'm not necessarily proposing that this *should* be done, just that it is a workable solution if it *has* to be done.

Personally I would have no objection to this approach but I'm sure there are others who would disagree.

Anna

While on paper, it looks good, in America, we have laws that prevent accessing credit bureaus without written signature (not faxed) and therefore, we are sending LL a signature anyways, we could just throw in an ID copy. If you notice through the legal jargon, a parent or guardian still has to apply with them. They can't just get it and poof, with no parental involvement.

Most of the cards in the USA from banks for people under 18 are 'flagged'. Unless the parent just hands over the card without checking in on them. This means that the card cannot be used to access any material which is labeled under 18. (Porn sites MUST have this check in place from a bill/act/law that went into place in 1997.) I am pretty sure that LL doesn't have this check in place for the main grid, however it's rather easy to implicate if they go back to verification.

However, Verification = age isn't the arguement for many of us. It's griefers and while some are probably pimply faced teenagers that think running around with a big penis attached to themselves is hilarious, I believe many of the grid crashing griefers are adults (by legal sense only).

Morwen, indeed the main issue IS accountability, as everyone has stressed. And as for adult verification, it is very important, since there is a thriving sex industry inside SL; I am part of it too and the thought that some of the girls that work in this industry using unverified accounts could very well be 12, 13, 14 years old scares the living daylights out of me. Imagine what would happen should some reporter find out that an SL escort is actually that young. I have protected myself from the risk of offering sexual services to a minor by steering clear of potential clients on unverified accounts; I know it's not a complete protection, but at least I can say I did what I could do to avoid running into trouble. Your ideas on adult verification are very valid and find me in agreement with them.

for reference: (IMNAL, but I've worked for banks and taken Real Estate license classes)

In the US, a minor cannot sign a legal contract. More specifically, a legal contract with a minor cannot be enforced. This means that a minor cannot own a checking account, which is required for a check card. A minor also cannot have a line of credit or a loan, since that also requires a contract.

Whenever you use a credit card at any point of sale, you actually sign a contract that says "I agree to pay this amount according to my agreement with my credit card company," or something similar. Using your PIN at an ATM is also considered a binding legal transaction: I don't remember exactly when it happened, but there is now legislation on the books that makes an "electronic signature", such as a PIN, as binding as a written signature.

However, it is possible for an adult to sign on the account, and then the account is co-owned by the minor and the adult. When the minor turns 18, the adult can be removed from the account.

As to the other side of this argument: having unique credit card numbers does NOT absolutely verify unique identity, but it is a piece in the puzzle that is absolutely required TO prove unique identity. Using several factors, including hardware ID's, IP addresses, CC numbers, and CC billing name/zip (which is verified along with the CC#), you can build a picture that identifies the individual well enough for LL's purposes.

Yes, hardware hashes can be faked, but to verify a credit card, the proper name, credit card number, and zip code have to be entered. It's also now possible to use the telephone number as part of the validation process. While this process is not perfect, it could certainly reduce the incidents of abuse on the grid.

The simple, inescapable fact is that SL runs on money. At some point, users must contribute to SL either creatively or financially. Without using a CC, there is no way for a user to contribute financially, and they can't even contribute creatively if they can't upload textures.

So why do we have accounts on SL that don't require any form of payment? If they can't buy things and can't make things, they are of absoutely no value to the system, and make SL slower and more expensive for those that DO contribute.

Even if you regularly buy L$ you're not contributing any significant value to the system because your money ends up in the hands of another resident and not LL for the most part, except for 30(?) cents on the buy order and 5% on the sell order.

Free accounts are needed for LL to convince real life companies that SL is worthwhile for them to either establish a presence in world as part of their marketing or for direct selling of real or virtual goods so I don't see them ever going away again. LL seems to want SL to turn into a commercial platform rather than an entertainment platform and the former favours numbers over stability.

On-topic I think adults sneaking on the teen grid will be a greater cause of concern than minors sneaking onto the adult grid. Intent and common sense are still the guideline; if you can show that you were acting under the reasonable assumption that the other party was an adult then nothing will happen even if they do turn out to be a minor. I guess a 15 year old pretending to be an adult roleplaying a 15 year old does present more of a problem.

Quick comment on the Free Accounts contributing: They do. I, personally, know two Basic (free) accounts that put over 1,000 USD a month into SL. You do not have to own land to buy/sell products, nor to "own" land on an Island sim.

Back to Age Verification:

No matter what means are used, if a 16 year old wants on the Main Grid, they will get on. Don't believe me? Think of the things you used to get away with when you were 16.

The Verification asked for is more a means for LL to control issues once they become issues.

After a griefing, LL can suspend an account for xxx number of days and be sure that person is not on as an alt. If a person is proved (or suspected of) being underage on the Main Grid, then LL can shut down that account with confidence until appropriate information is obtained by LL.

Either means are breaking the rules that LL has laid down for usage of SL, and that all who log in have agreed to.

What we need is a way to enforce those rules.

Right now we don't. People worry about underagers because they want to protect them. (Yes, some are doing it out of self-preservation, but I think you'd find a majority are voicing such to protect the kids) It won't keep them out, but it will let us handle the situation when they get in.

~Jessy

CC Bill is used as a method for paid subscriptions (in another game I used to play) to verify that a potential player is an adult. Whether they offer age verification for unpaid or a one-time fee of, say, $1 is up for grabs.

basically, it boils down to the PARENTS responsibility to pay attention to what thier child does on the internet. if a parent gives a child a cc and/or signs a document accepting responsibility for the cc, the it is the PARENT who is liable.

yes america is sue happy and suffers from itnotmyfaultitis, however there is no excuse in this day and age to not have filters and codes on the family or childs computer.

Morwen made an excellent point in controlling what her child can and cannot see(with her childs input) on the net. wish every parent was like her. another solution to this, lock the computer until said parent can sit with child and watch what they are doin.

as for the verification issue, its way too easy for a child to sign up using it as it now stands.
i have chased away many a minor(after asking them how old they are, and even then after some strange responses to afew general questions) from the club i used to manage. its scary as hell to think that while you are enjoyin adult situations, that thier could be the chance a 10yo is standign there(or participating). closing out the unverifyable sign up will prolly curb this(not saying ALL unveris are kids, but LL swung the door wide open for them when they implemented it)

we will prolly go round and round and never come up with a happy solution for all, that is until LL gets sued by a parent who had no time to monitor thier childs computer usuage.

I'm not so sure LL needs to be in the business of minding others youngsters, to me that is a parents responsibility. A question "are you over 18 yrs of age?" should be sufficient.

What most concerns me, and should LL is how they can track back a grid hacker that causes so many problems in SL, time and money to all of us. If there is no positive verification of who's behind the avatar, then this type of behaviour will flourish.

In the US it states on our social security cards, that they are not to be used for identification, altho they are in most every instance, including credit. I am sure easier ways abound either thru credit/debit cards, pay pal, or some resource on the web that can verify who is behind the applicant for a membership to SL. Not least, an email should be established as not fake, by sending the first pass code to it in the form of an email, to get in the website to set up a profile and change the password to one more to the liking of the customer. Yes a tad bit more time consuming, but well worth the effort later if needing to track down a problem.

When i first came to SL just 2 years ago, the grid hackers were unheard of, now it seems a weekly occurrence, and actually i am astounded that more isn't done to eliminate it. Plugging the holes wont stop it, but being able to press charges would.

I agree. And actually the percentage taken, is QUITE a bit. IF you are selling say... 100,000L a month, LL gets several dollars of that. Sure it doesn't sound like a lot, but over several hundred people, who have probably bought some as well, plus the fees once they cash out to transfer them to paypal or check, those fees do get to adding up.

And also to mention to Kitty:


You are though, because if you buy and sell L, you pay the fees, your money DOES go to the hands of another resi, who uses that money to probably sell some Lindens, so it's fee'd again, when another resi buys the L, then there is more fees and they spend their money again. So you see, while you may think just ending up in another resi's hands is a loss, it's called economy. Each transaction, someone buys or sells, and eventually it ends up in the hands of someone else who pays fees to do their business.

I.E. I buy 10,000L to go on a shopping spree at Joe's House of Pancakes. I am charged on that which I buy. I then spend all 10k. Joe now has 10k. He cashes out for a percentage lost. I decide to do more shopping. I buy another 10k. I pay more fees and spend another 10k at Amy's House of Ribs. Amy then cashes out for another set of fees.

In just that short amount of time and transactions, LL has made roughly 60 cents on my buying and 3 dollars on sell fees. $3.60

I then have no money to create content and buy ANOTHER 2k to upload a ton.

Sounds pitiful? Maybe. But multiply it by about 5,000 at any given moment who are shopping and trading...

To be very honest, I rather see the grid down for a day or two then a youngster getting involved in situations they cannot controle, cannot judge and may lead to trauma's if things really go wrong.... even when they cheated to get into the aldult grid.

Grid down may make me grumpy, trauma's to a youngster is a lot worse.

Morwen.

Of all the commerce in Second Life of which I broadly approve, the sex business is the one single business that causes me to have serious concerns, and if you combine that with unverified accounts I agree that is a big problem just waiting to happen.

If I try hard to set aside my own moral feelings on this point there are three possible solutions, one or more of which Linden should use.

1) A new land classification, X rated, with no access to this type of land for unverified accounts.

2) Linden should intervene in the in world business of Second Life via the TOS and insist that anyone working in the sex industry should have verified accounts. I define the sex industry as anything ranging through from soft porn and art to prostitution.

3) Prostitution… that is the offer of virtual or actual sex for money should only be allowed in X rated land. Private Island owners would be able to choose this classification if they wanted to

Any breech of these rules should be punished by life long exclusion from Second Life AND Linden should report the users IP address (and anything else it has on ID) to the relevant authorities of the users country

Sorry to be blunt but I think that responsible sex workers would come to see the wisdom of such a robust attitude

Regards

John

Aww a 4 year old Stange my 1 year old is a lover of computers already

Anway ways............I too am a non usa person and the CC processessing etc. is a reall pain in the rabbit tail! If your not inthe usa Forget it! Llabs careless about you.

There must be a better way around this age proving concept. As it stands now. its failing bad!

Don't agree. A good and valid age-validation in combination of parents taking there responcibilty as parents would be more then enough.

For the rest I think it as RL, it is there. It is up to one get involved or not. That is what my Dutch commonsense tells me .

And no, I am not a "sex worker".

Morwen.

Well I am based in the Uk so I know Holland fairly well and am aware attitudes on this issue differ in our two countries, no disrespect intended.

My point was to put forward a suggestion that will not detract from Second Life's membership growth in terms of allowing free initial access without the need for a credit card, while having robust protection to try to prevent minors from becoming involved in things they should not.

Ohh.. there was no disrespect felt on this side ^^.

I think that any account should be validated. The none-paid ones and paid ones. And the accounts that claim to be 18+ should be extra strong validated and I wouldn't mind if they uses my date of birthday connected to my creditcard for that (but I understand that this would be an problem in other countries).

But even that is not a garangtee for everything. I saw once how by people I was visiting a boy of 15 (I think) came up to his father and asked his credit card because he wanted to buy something on the net. Well, my mouth must have dropped wide open when the boy got the card without questions asked.

If my 17th year old wants something like that, we first talk about what and how. And if we come to an agreement, I will be the one who does the payment, not she.

Morwen.

While I sympathize with all non USA people, there ARE means and ways which have been discussed at length for outside the USA'ers to get verified. Frankly, if you do not have a bank account, or the money to get one (to use through paypal of course), you'd probably be more worried about your next month's rent, than you should be worried about playing SL. But even without a bank account, there have been many ways to show how to get verified.

As I've said over and over and over, and said it harshly.... Risk vs. reward. I'd rather lose a few good unverified members of the community, than to deal with the grid down this much along with all the hacks where parts of the grid must be disabled.

You see, this is where you would hope, that since the card was in the actual father's name (as opposed to a teen's credit card, stored savings, etc.) that not only did the child participate in fraud (whatever it was to buy, you have to 'mark' that you are the cardowner), but then it would show that consent was given to the child. If the father denies, then the child is responsible for theft if something were to ever happen.