Growing adoption of mandatory age-verification laws requires platforms to collect and store sensitive government IDs and biometric face scans.
Recent data leaks highlight the systemic privacy risks and security challenges of centralizing user identity documents.
The identification process and security risks
To prove their age, users are often asked to send official documents, such as government-issued IDs, or take facial scans and selfies. These rules apply to websites and apps with a significant amount of adult content, although the terms often remain unclear.
The collection and storage of such sensitive data comes with serious risks. A typical example is the platform Discord, which faced a leak of more than 70.000 government IDs after implementing age verification measures. A similar incident occurred at the dating app Tea, where a security breach led to the leak of thousands of women's government IDs.
The consequences of data leaks
When official documents and users' personal information fall into the wrong hands, the risks are great. The consequences include identity theft, impersonation, credit card fraud, blackmail, as well as real-life threats.
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To address loopholes in the restrictions, some areas are taking additional measures. The Utah Senate passed a bill that makes it illegal to use location-anonymizing technologies, such as VPNs, to bypass age checks.
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