In March, I reported on California’s Digital Age Assurance Act, requiring operating system providers in the state to collect users’ age information during setup, including Windows, macOS, Android, iOS, Linux distros like SteamOS, and more.
The bill was unanimously passed by both the Assembly and Senate and is scheduled to take effect on January 1, 2027. However, California lawmakers are introducing a new amendment that will exempt open-source operating systems from the state’s forthcoming Digital Age Assurance Act (via Tom's Hardware).
This means open-source operating systems like Linux, including its mainstream distros like Debian, Fedora, Ubuntu, Arch Linux, and more, will be exempt from the mandatory age checks during setup.
According to the new amendment in the controversial bill:
"An operating system provider or developer that distributes an operating system or application under license terms that permit a recipient to copy, redistribute, and modify the software without any platform-imposed technical or contractual restrictions imposed by the provider or developer on installing all modified versions."
I previously argued that age verification checks for open-source operating systems like Linux distros would be an uphill task because they don’t have centralized accounts, and users can download ISOs from global mirrors and freely modify the source code.
"This is basically impossible for California to enforce," a user lamented. "Even if Linux Mint decides to add some kind of age verification, to comply with CA law, there's no reason anyone would choose that version."
Elsewhere, GrapheneOS, a privacy-focused Android-based operating system, indicated that it won't be party to emerging laws requiring mandatory age verification during setup. "If devices can't be sold in a region due to its regulations, so be it," GrapheneOS added.
On the other hand, age verification is not a new phenomenon in the Windows ecosystem. Users are already required to provide their date of birth during the Microsoft Account setup process.
However, Microsoft pledged to improve the general user sentiment around Windows 11 by addressing pain points across the operating system, which could lead to scrapping the mandatory Microsoft account when setting up a new PC. As such, you can technically bypass the age verification checks in the Windows ecosystem.
It'll be interesting to see how everything unfolds, especially after more states and potentially the whole world embrace age verification measures to protect users from harmful or inappropriate content.
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