California’s brand‑new Digital Age Assurance Act (AB 1043), slated to kick in on January 1 2027, apparently thinks that asking a user to punch in their birthdate during OS setup will magically protect minors online. The law drags every operating system and app developer into the “protect‑the‑kids” parade, demanding collection of age data at account creation and even broadcasting age brackets to developers when apps are installed.
In a fit of community‑driven optimism, Ubuntu developer Aaron Rainbolt floated an optional D‑Bus interface (org.freedesktop.AgeVerification1) on the Ubuntu mailing list, hoping distributions could plug‑in age checks whenever they felt like it. Canonical’s response was, unsurprisingly, a corporate shrug: “We’re aware of the legislation and are reviewing it with legal counsel, but we have no concrete plans to change Ubuntu – at least not yet.” Jon Seager, Canonical’s VP of Engineering, reminded everyone that the mailing‑list thread was a casual chat, not a binding announcement, and that no code had been committed.
Fedora and Linux Mint are reportedly whispering about similar “features” for their next releases, while MidnightBSD has taken the extreme route of simply banning California users from its desktop altogether. Unfortunately, the nightmare isn’t limited to those three distros. The bill would eventually ensnare every GNU/Linux flavour, every desktop environment, and even app stores like Flathub and Snap, especially as sister‑state proposals in New York and Colorado start popping up.
And let’s not forget the global trend: the EU’s Digital Services Act has been humming along since February 2024, with late‑2025 add‑ons that explicitly demand robust age verification for certain services. So the open‑source community’s collective gasp over “apps that might infer exact birth dates” and “government surveillance” feels less like a surprise and more like the inevitable sequel to every privacy‑rights horror story ever written.
In short, the Linux crowd is being asked to trade a little anonymity for a bureaucratic birthday‑check, and the whole thing smells less like child safety and more like a textbook case of regulatory overreach. The law might be coming, but the consensus remains: the open‑source world isn’t exactly lining up to become the next Big Brother.
Via Ubuntu, Fedora, Linux Mint Eye Age Verification Amid California Law Backlash – 9to5Linux
If it has a ‘smart’ prefix, it’s a dumb idea. That is all I have to say about that.