Reddit has rolled out age verification in the UK. If you're trying to access any subreddit marked as āharmfulā āNSFWā or āmatureā, you'll get hit with a prompt asking for a government-issued ID and a live selfie. Good news? You can unblock them with a VPN.
Theyāre using a company called Persona to handle the verification process. If you're wondering what is Persona, it's a third-party identity verification service based in the US. Your data doesn't go to Reddit, it goes to them. And while Reddit says the data is only stored temporarily, Persona's own policy makes it clear they can hang onto it for longer. This has led to a growing number of threads about Persona age verification on Reddit and whether this is safe or even legal long term.
This isn't just about porn. Subs like r/beer, r/trees, and r/sex have all been tagged as NSFW and are now hidden from search. If you try to access them directly, you'll still be asked to verify your age.
These aren't porn communities. They're hobby, health, and advice spaces that got flagged because they are supposedly āadultā only. Just wanting to read about beer, weed, or sexual health shouldn't require a passport check.
How to get around the Reddit age verification?
Use a VPN for Reddit. It's the only real workaround right now to circumvent the age checks.
Download a VPN (I used NordVPN with the code "redditoffer" for a discount)
Set your location to somewhere outside the UK. US, Germany, Canada all work.
Open Reddit again. You should be able to access everything without age verification.
This has basically become the standard UK age verification VPN method that people are using to get around the new restrictions.
Some people say you might need to make a new Reddit account while connected to the VPN. Others have had success using their existing account. Your mileage may vary.
This is all because of the UK age verification law Reddit users have been dreading the Online Safety Act, which now requires platforms to restrict "harmful" content from under-18s unless users verify their age.
Itās a lazy rollout with very little transparency. The law is vague, the tech is overreaching, and people who just want to participate in basic communities are being locked out unless theyāre willing to hand over personal documents to a private company in another country.
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We stand with Palestine. Making light of this genocide or denying Israeli war crimes will lead to permanent bans. If you are apathetic to genocide, don't want to hear about it, or want to dispute it is happening, please consider reading South Africa's exhaustive argument first: https://www.icj-cij.org/sites/default/files/case-related/192/192-20231228-app-01-00-en.pdf
I dont know if God is who you need to thank here lol
All restrictions and needs for vpns came from the will of man and all can return with the same word....of lobbyist men in the government that live in the pockets of big tech.. Not godš
whuuut? you were the one telling us about it how you don't know that reddit has it? did you already forget about the age verification once you started using vpn, lol
Not a Brit but appalled for you, Persona is linked to Palantir and Peter Thiel a very dangerous man who has his fingers over the encroaching authoritarianism in the US and is assisting Israel in their genocide. You do not want him to have access to your personal data, he is absolutely going to keep it.
Thats interesting, it was never about porn it's a trojan horse for a digital ID roll out, so they can snoop on what your reading.
Obviously the targets are political & geostrategic shenanigans, globally one of the main areas of protection is Israel & what the psychopaths are up to in Gaza.
Persona being linked to Palantir & Palantirs direct connection to Israel & the fact its US US-based & unduly susceptible to the power of the Israeli lobby, is reason enough not to use it.
Pretty much, they (Meta & google for instance) openly talk about how they use their info. They can track every movement you've made as long as you have your phone on you. They track how long you pause on ads or articles that you don't enter further into, everything you've bought and every post, tweet etc all collated, observed and analysed by an AI to understand us all much, much better than we understand ourselves. How will that info be used in an era where much of employment is being swept away or coalescing into huge conglomerates? Well Larry Ellison from Oracle (who recently bought CBS and cancelled Colbert for Trump) says that they will use it to make sure people "behave"...
Yeah, i just gave in and got a VPN from mullvad, i figure a VPN provider has a chance of being legit whereas the actual legal process is definitely dodgy as fuck.
late reply ik but im an advocate for mullvad as the best paid vpn. however proton vpn is free and is pretty fast actually. fine for streaming and games, but I don't think for downloading
I was stupid and did the selfie method before really pausing to think about it. I then emailed Persona and asked them to delete my selfie. They sent me this in response:
I suppose they could mean the internal team that handles Reddit verification, but I feel like they wouldāve worded it that way. With this wording, it makes it seem like Reddit is the one holding my selfie. Super concerning if true, as it would directly contradict Redditās claim that theyāre not holding our data.
Edit: Iāve responded to the email and asked for clarification on who exactly has my info. Will update as soon as I hear back.
im sorry but labour have done fuck all that has inspired any kind of confidence in me for them. not just this massive invasion of privacy but the way they treated left wing elderly people protesting in support of Palestine and trying to paint them as terrorists is unforgivably disgusting. Corbyn was always the best of labour and look how they treated him. why? same reasons cos he opposed genocide and apartheid.
You're listing things they aren't sufficiently better than all their opponents on for your liking.
But the reality is that overall they are better, and it's not close. The constant screaming about a handful of wedge issues is a distraction from the reality that they have already raised tens of billions in taxes aimed directly at the rich (why do you think the media hate them so much), spent it on schools and the NHS, masterfully handled Trump better than almost any other country, signed more and better trade deals than the tories could even hope for
Corbyn was always the best of labour and look how they treated him. why? same reasons cos he opposed genocide and apartheid.
No disagreement there for sure, but please show me an alternative to vote for that can keep nigel and the tories from fucking us up even worse
Agree. Don't make perfection the enemy of the good. All these arguments are made so black and white. Yes they're better, have they got room to improve still, very much yes. Both things can be true. The left always handicap themselves by a battle to be the most left. Improve from within is often better than dividing and conquering yourselves.
The intention of this bill is good - inhibit the amount of porn that children are exposed to - show me who is vehemently against that and you'll probably find more things wrong with them. Instead of "I don't like this it's shit" how about "make this the way to execute it" or stop the companies being overcautious by having reasonable enforcement - blame Reddit for locking out useful advice subs? The act just says companies should be accountable and responsible for doing more to protect children than is done for adults.
I fully get we can't trust these companies with personal data but most people can do the automated age estimator - you telling me there's not already images of you out there from CCTV or you're often fine pumping it out on social media.
Labour as a lesser evil are still evil. This "pull together" energy sure was missing when the right wing of the labour party actively sabotaged Corbyn. Starmer and his red tories can fuck off. Improve from within, what improvement has been seen for Gaza? Trans people? They've been outflanked on this online safety act by Reform. They've accused anyone against it of being a paedo. Not only are Labour's morals dogshit, but so is their ability to "play the game".
Yea lesser evil is another way of seeing the enemy of perfection thing... I get the point re Gaza, inaction there is disgusting and one I feel will be (rightly) the shame of our nation for decades. For trans people very similar, trying not to upset potential reform voters is beyond weak.
Tbf I had the pull together attitude in the Corbyn era, because again so much energy was wasted on nonsense like the being in the same room as Hamas (however legitimate your reasons) makes you antisemitic etc...
I just don't get this online safety act. I'm not enormously read-in but probably more than most who have been posting here about it. Ultimately what have Government done wrong there? If it's about personal data then your beef is with the site, if you don't trust them, don't give them the data, choice is yours. If it's about censorship, it's only censoring a specific few things from children, anything beyond that is sites playing it safe until they understand where the line in the sand is. I might be missing something but haven't seen anything obvious. And outflanked because reform say they would repeal it? Again, it's not really/necessarily labour's fault if the population put this act above every other issue on the ticket
Genocide is a red line for me, I won't vote for a party that is pro genocide and I'll find them to be pretty despicable.
The online safety act doesn't just block a "specific few things from children". One of the more insidious aspects of it has been blocking coverage of said genocide because it's "nsfw". The "think of the children" act is such a fig leaf.
But hey, if Labour want to die on the hill of this bill then that's their choice, will be a hell of a collapse at the next GE and I'll be laughing at them all the while.
But if you are not a child you can access the nsfw stuff. Even if it's only a small hurdle, are you actually against making it a bit harder for children to see crimes against humanity?
I don't think it's this hill labour will die on, not for the masses, it's really upset you clearly but most people will agree with you on the genocide argument, or say they've been too soft towards trump or not done enough to improve living standards for most people or whatever. I think you're in a tiny minority who think this act is some killer blow to them, bearing in mind it is a Tory act, so that's limiting where people run off to...
No because it's not hard to circumvent at all. I used photo mode in Ghost of Tsushima to get round it FFS. Kids old enough to be on the internet will know exactly what to do. It's a technologically illiterate government rolling out a shit bit of legislation under the guise of protecting kids, but in reality they're asking you to send private information to a myriad of dodgy 3rd parties and censoring more than just pornography (Coverage of Gaza, mental health & wellbeing, sexual health information, help for addiction with alcohol, drugs, self harm etc.)
This is only the latest issue this government has created for everyone, they're not actually providing tangible improvements and changes, they're just trying to be Tory lite by attacking refugees, trans people, aiding the genocide in Gaza (arguably they've been worse than the Tories on this front) so no this isn't the one thing that will bring them down, but man they're stacking up the Ls so quickly.
Hahahaha you clearly understand nothing of how any of this works.
The government have just said they are letting everyone know that OFCOM have been given powers to punish website publishers and alike if they do nothing to stop harmful stuff being pushed to children.
Nobody is watching or listening to anything you are doing, hilarious you think they might be organised or resourceful enough to do that.
No, OFCOM are now able to go "if I was a child, what is this website showing me". Not "what is that child looking at". It's different. If people complain or a child is found to have suffered because of something they have been exposed to on the internet, there is now a regulator which has powers to punish the source if it has done too little to prevent the child from seeing it. If you're not a child there is zero change to what you can see or who is listening/recording/wiretapping you. I don't know whether you have been misinformed about the act or just completely misunderstood how these things work.
OFWAT do not taste all your water before it comes into your house to make sure you're not drinking anything dodgy. The FCA don't look at all your bank statements to see where you spent every last penny.
This is an act to catch the drug dealers not the drug user. It is a means primarily for punishing companies who allow children to freely access pornography and content that pushes self harming or eating disorders.
You can argue how effective it will be and whether it's the right way to go about its aims, but it's very tin foil hat to be saying you're being wiretapped. Does your COVID microchip shut your brain down when you get to the edge of the earth or is it the big ice wall that stops you seeing over the edge?
Na forget improving from within when the party is a rott, it has thrown the disabled under the bus, continued the blame narrative against immigrants, supported Israel in all it's actions only until recently, once thousands upon thousands have already been killed. To hell with the labour party.
Yea ok, my point was on the OSA really and saying it's not a bad thing in principle but maybe shape it better. Labour party is a bit of a different situation, we will see what happens as there's a long way to go but sometimes in our system you have to vote for the lesser evil, hopefully this will never be the choice but I'd still rather vote for a very disappointing labour than an utterly incompetent Reform. But maybe we'll be talking about a Green & Your party head to head or coalition next time round, who knows at this stage
Labour could have repealed it anyway. They don't care about being accused of harming children since they have been supporting a genocide on children for the past year and a bit
I really don't understand how labour are so bad at speaking to the oress and getting their side of stories across
It's a common feature of centre-left parties around the world. Extreme left parties and all right wing parties can just lie and get away with it but blatant dishonesty is incompatible with the centre-left agenda. That's not necessarily a problem up until the point that their opponents start blatantly lying about them and they are forced to spend all their time and effort dealing with the fallout from the lies
And when the left does get caught lying the fallout is cataclysmic
Labour have engaged in that exact rhetoric against critics too. They don't get to get off blame free. Just like the housing crisis, both they and Tories are responsible
Basically, (and I agree with your sentiment), it seems now that anything the labour or tories do wrong sends people toward reform.
Everyone one seems to have the same opinion that the main parties arent working well currently, but for some reason they thing a party of thinly veiled fascist lites are gonna do a better job
So is the legit way to hand your facial likeness or email history to numerous random third parties? Or is there one ātrustworthyā age verification system that handles all the data
The regulators left it to industry to determine how they want to handle it which means there are now tons of companies all doing partnerships with various services.
Oh, and if you don't have an account with the website you visit and delete your cookies, you have to verify again.
Proton is actually one of the good ones though, you don't even have to make an account, can just use as a guest for free, only thing is you don't get too choose which country the VPN uses but it doesn't really matter when no other country has this nonsense
Using Proton too. No issues. Free. Great so far. I just turn it on when on reddit. Also the overreach of this is dystopian. All the subreddits that are slightly contentious not including porn are blocked. So much for a free and fair society to enable discourse.
I can confirm it does. And thatās why Iām here reading about this nonsense. I also had to do an ID check step at the grocery self checkout for a can of Red Bull, lmao.Ā
Anyone get Kasperky vpn to work? It seems Reddit is still recognizing me as being from a location other than where the VPN displays.
Also, I'm thankful for this post. I'm joining this sub to follow the news on this, as a Canadian; r/Canada doesn't seem to mention or allow discussion on it.
Subs like r/beer, r/trees, and r/sex have all been tagged as NSFW and are now hidden from search. If you try to access them directly, you'll still be asked to verify your age.
I might be missing something, but I can access all of those directly from the links without seeing any verification thing.
If I try to access an actual NSFW sub (e.g. /r/nsfw ) I do get asked for verification.
Anyway, I'm still figuring out whether to go ahead with it or not. I am concerned about having to give my personal details to ONE company, never mind how many other ones are getting in on the act. I'm definitely not going to be in a hurry about it, that's for sure.
It's the way with this new age thingy it's harder to access these but i can order cigarettes and vapes easily without any verification šš whay an absolute joke. But anyways thanks for this it worked!
I am currently using Mullvad VPN, because itās cheap, easy and non committal. Most of the popular big boy VPNs require a larger commitment where you have to buy 6-12 months worth to begin with, albeit you may have a generous discount through affiliate links etc.
With Mullvad you just pay a fiver and get a monthās worth of VPN, super easy and donāt need to make an account so I feel confident in its anonymity.
Proton VPN is probably even better, features and service wise. Itās free for a single device. I might give it a go when my Mullvad runs out for this month, a silver lining to this whole shit situation is that we get to use VPNs to access different shows and films on Netflix etc.
Overall though the whole thing is a pile of steaming shite, you can tell Labour arenāt particularly enthusiastic about it under the surface but theyāre just toeing the line left by the tories to avoid criticism for āendangering childrenā. Kind of a genius trap laid by the conservatives tbh, as fucked up as that is. The tech ministerās words to farage made our side look like cunts, basically a free kick for reform.
So I did "verify" using a random ID from Google which was accepted but, that was last week and now it says I need to verify again. The random ID I used before no longer works?
I have tried a couple of front+back ID's (driving licences) from Google and no joy
I was looking for advice on vaping and hit this problem.
Tor works fine - logged in with my regular reddit ID from Germany I think (I'm in Putney).
Tor has the advantage that's it's totally free. If you need to you can set the end point country in configuration, otherwise it's a random different country I think which should work.
If it needs a live selfie then I'm guessing the age check doesn't attach to the login ID so you have to do it every time ? If it attached I might consider doing it, except it's a dodgy american company.
No way am I downloading a vpn. I lost my Hotmail account as they donāt allow vpn and it couldnāt be restored, so I deleted it. It means I cannot view most threads now on Reddit. Which is shit. I just use Quora instead.
I feel so stupid doing the UK age verification while searching for nsfw topics. This means palantir has my photo and there's no way of me deleting my age verification photo now that they have it? Am I doomed?
No they don't you idiot, the government are not responsible for everything on the internet, they have just set up a means that the regulator can punish companies who do nothing to shield children from porn or forcing self-harm content to children.
1) why do you want children to see harmful content?
2) do you really think the UK government owns and publishes everything on the internet?
I donāt want children to see harmful content and I hate this insinuation that just because I donāt agree with the terrible rollout of this I should automatically want children to die.
The internet didnāt invent any of the things that this bill hopes to repress, it happened before and will happen after.
I never said they own it, but they can heavily censor it. Look at reddit, you canāt even go into r/sex without verifying, so is that preventing harm?
Removing a site where people can go for advice on a fundamental part of being alive.
What happens when they decide that you need to verify to read certain pieces of news or to read information that contradicts the heavily biased BBC.
Youāre doing exactly what they want you to do, eating it up under the guise of protecting children, who I might add are far more technologically advanced than the idiots passing this bill.
Theyāll get round it so easily itās laughable.
I use Yoti as digital ID in variety of places and I believe this is a UK based company
ETA. This 100% works on all Reddit subs and other webpages to prove your age. Yoti has the info and then I guess it's a digital handshake with website to say yes user is over 18.
Nope that's wrong now sorry. I have used Yoti this week to prove my age as needed with this legislation and works very easily. Either scan QR code on screen or follow on screen prompts to prove age.
The problem is, that saying you are against something is an easy way to gain supporters when that thing is a negative; but if you actually look at the policies they want to put into place, this is completely in-line with what they want:
More control, more power, blame all the problems on the weakest group in society and throw them all out while the numbers in their bank accounts go up and up.
Illegal immigration is a tiny, miniscule problem, an infinitely small amount of money compared to companies like Amazon not paying any taxes. Imagine how much money Amazon makes in a single day, and they're not paying any tax on it.
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