this post was submitted on 24 Mar 2026
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Add a required birth date prompt (YYYY-MM-DD) to the user creation flow, stored as a systemd userdb JSON drop-in at /etc/userdb/.user on the target system.

Motivation

Recent age verification laws in California (AB-1043), Colorado (SB26-051), Brazil (Lei 15.211/2025), etc. require platforms to verify user age. Collecting birth date at install time ensures Arch Linux is compliant with these regulations.

This is just a pull request, no changes yet.

The pull-request discussion thread has been locked, just like it happened for the similar thread in Systemd, owing to the amount of negative comments...

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[–] Digit@lemmy.wtf 5 points 3 hours ago

Discussion?

Yeah. That's not what's happening.

Censoring dissent, is what I hear is happening.

[–] GreenKnight23@lemmy.world 4 points 8 hours ago

evidently the systemd and arch requests were from the same guy.

[–] spectrums_coherence@piefed.social 76 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (7 children)

This dude need to chill, he also pushed the systemd change, and in his blog he seems to believe android "advance flow" for sideloading protects users.

The one they are targeting is California's AB-1043, which still have three quarters of a year before it comes into effect...

I think this dude might get too excited for his new subscription of claude code or whatever, and decided to spam every project with these request. Some of these are reasonable, some are compliance in advance.

Also this dude writes two freaking blog every week with LLM. If I were him, I would try to find some joy in my personal life...

[–] StealthLizardDrop@piefed.social 17 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I fully expect this person to not be even real and instead just another ai bot to push agenda for corporate scum

[–] teft@piefed.social 11 points 15 hours ago (2 children)

He’s the third highest contributor to archinstall.

https://github.com/dylanmtaylor

Still a dipshit but probably not a bot.

[–] StealthLizardDrop@piefed.social 3 points 7 hours ago

Fair enough that's pretty surprising, so even Arch is not safe from lunatics... That is disappointing. As a Manjaro user, I am likely to pick up their changes via both systemd and since Manjaro is Arch based... Sad and disappointed by useful morons who have no fucking clue.

[–] underscores@lemmy.zip 3 points 11 hours ago (2 children)

it's so strange to me that he tried to add age verification scripting changes in archinstall. isn't that the wrong place systemd makes sense but I'm puzzled by the archinstall pr

[–] JackbyDev@programming.dev 4 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

The thing that's frustrating is that if the age verification laws weren't there and they wanted to add a birthday field it wouldn't seem bad. Details about the human using the account like first and last name are already stored. All you really need is username. But because it's explicitly in reaction to age verification laws we have to be skeptical about adding it.

[–] khleedril@cyberplace.social 3 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

@JackbyDev @underscores Yes we do, because it is an erosion of our freedom.

[–] JackbyDev@programming.dev 1 points 7 hours ago

You're saying that in a post age verification world though, my whole point is that if this were there before it wouldn't seem bad. I'm not saying we should add it now because it would've been fine before.

[–] GreenKnight23@lemmy.world 3 points 8 hours ago

fascist cocks won't suck themselves.

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[–] dangling_cat@piefed.blahaj.zone 39 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Never comply with advance. Nazi wants that. Make them fight for it. Let them sue, and get community funding for the case, and then delay the court case again and again, and maybe comply when they lose.

If you comply with advance, you are actively helping them, along with creating fear.

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[–] rando@sh.itjust.works 36 points 1 day ago (5 children)

It’s very obvious this is just an entry point to degrade even more of our privacy and rights. How many times is this kind of shit gonna keep happening and people will still fall for it.

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[–] Solumbran@lemmy.world 53 points 1 day ago (22 children)

I don't know what people expect.

All big linux distros are going to be quickly a target, because the people who like age verification laws like that hate the idea of free software.

Putting a dummy, useless age input, is a good way to comply maliciously, and can be easily reverted if these stupid laws ever get removed.

It wouldn't surprise me if obvious ways to bypass it appear a few seconds after the changes are validated.

The alternative is that these systems could be outawed in a lot of places, which would have a much more negative impact than an age field.

War is about knowing to take a hit to avoid defeat, sometimes.

[–] dsilverz@calckey.world 20 points 1 day ago (2 children)

@Solumbran@lemmy.world @pglpm@lemmy.ca @linux@programming.dev

The Brazilian flavor of age checking explicitly prohibits self-declaring ("vedada a autodeclaração"). Estimation of age via selfie or behavioral analysis, as well as the need for government-issued IDs, perhaps validation via credit card microtransactions, are some of the accepted age verification mechanisms for Lei 15211 ("ECA Digital" or, more informally known as "Lei Felca" due to the involvement of a YouTuber sub-celebrity on getting this thing to Brazilian lawmakers). Doing age bracketing via self-declared mechanisms, such as birthdate input or the usual consent button, risks fines and other provisions.

KYC ("Know Your Customer") is, deep down, what these laws are going to be about, ID checks as sine qua non part of purposefully vague-worded laws with broad and outreaching enforcement, so tech organizations and companies worldwide, especially the smaller ones, will eventually find themselves in a situation where they are legally compelled to implement everything that's being pushed as part of these dystopian laws. After all, it's far from being just a Brazilian or a Californian thing.

Currently, yes, we're seeing this law-concept restricted to a handful of places such as some USian states, as well as countries such as UK, Australia, Canada, now Brazil... Zoom out, however, and you'll realize how this thing is gradually spreading worldwide because this is the only way for age verification to get effectively enforced.

You read it correctly, those laws are very likely getting to more and more countries, eventually turning KYC into part of international, industrial standards. Nothing too hard for big corps to do on their own, such as Google and Microsoft, even Canonical and Red Hat which are large companies, but small companies will end up being pushed into relying on non-free third-party KYC services in order to comply with age verification.

Such situation would end up benefiting the big players, with KYC services such as Persona becoming the new ubiquitous Cloudflare when it comes to this digital landscape. KYC gates, in this sense, would become the new CAPTCHA, Biometrics-as-a-service would become the new normal, true FOSS projects would become unlawful a priori while large corporations would thrive with another data point for tracking and advertising, and as the tolerance bar gets lowered, people will end up used to it, because any attempt to be against it will lead, at best, to social ostracization...

I don't know, maybe I'm being overly pessimistic about it, but I can't help but notice how dystopian things, some of which were long foretold and were warned about, are slowly taking away our privacy and freedom...

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[–] andioop@programming.dev 25 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (6 children)

I have no idea what to think because this sounds reasonable, but so do the arguments that it's a slippery slope and complying now makes it easier to surveil us all later. (Yes, I know this is the name of a fallacy. I'm curious as to when is it a fallacy and when is it not. I can absolutely imagine people saying "slippery slope fallacy" and being right, I can also imagine a different situation where people say "slippery slope fallacy" to something and it happens exactly as the people whose claim is being denied with "slippery slope" fallacy said.)

I guess that is why controversial issues are controversial, no easy and obvious resolution?

[–] Cethin@lemmy.zip 6 points 22 hours ago

A slippery slope isn't always a fallacy. Yes, that is a specific name of a fallacy, which people commonly point out, but it is also the form of a valid logical argument. If there is support that this will happen, it isn't a fallacy.

I this case, a user-entered field is useless to "protect children" (being generous and assuming this is the actual reason for the laws). Children will just lie, as they have been doing for decades. The state will point to this as the law not fulfilling its stated goals, so they'll need to verify age through other means. Even if the goal isn't surveillance of people, this is still likely to be the result logically. This means the slippery slope argument is valid.

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[–] StealthLizardDrop@piefed.social 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

This law affects so few people in the world, they can bugger off with their changes. No one on my entire content is affected by this stupidity.

[–] Digit@lemmy.wtf 1 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

This law affects so few people in the world

It's not just one law (/statute).

Around a third of a billion and increasing, seems a strange quantity to dismiss as "so few people in the world".

No one on my entire content is affected by this stupidity.

Continent?

How long will that last?

[–] StealthLizardDrop@piefed.social 1 points 2 hours ago

Continent Thank you yes

It’s not just one law (/statute). Around a third of a billion and increasing, seems a strange quantity to dismiss as “so few people in the world”. EU alone has more population than the affected regions by a few hundred million. Why should we be putting up with this nonsense in advance? This is absolutely wrong and how does this get affected by our GDPR laws? Please don't forget that not everyone lives in a complete technocratic dystopia and we place more value on certain protections. Trying to predict when the next ludicrous right wing nonces will win and try to put through their own child molesting agendas in EU seems premature.

How long until USA becomes the new Noth Korea where you can only get 28 state sanctioned haircuts? Should we comply with this requirement too? You know its only a matter of time isn't it? (If sarcasm is not clear, I apologise for nothing)

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[–] xyro@morbier.foo 17 points 1 day ago

Please don't make me switch distro :(

[–] rhubarbe@tarte.nuage-libre.fr 8 points 1 day ago (1 children)

What does he mean by required? This law would apply to a tiny fraction of users - no one in my continent for example. I hope he understands there's no way it should be required for everyone.

[–] StealthLizardDrop@piefed.social 5 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

This law affects exactly 0 users on my entire content... So why do I need this nonsense? Even systemd change is bullshit and doesn't affect me or anyone on my continent.

[–] itsathursday@lemmy.world 19 points 1 day ago (8 children)

My Linux based IOT devices will now need age verification for default accounts..? And now any devices will expect to have non-shareable specific accounts…? So to open my fridge and use its apps I need to verify as me..? I’m me?

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[–] it_depends_man@lemmy.world 16 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (11 children)

Imo, the move would be if all linux distros were to let the date come and go and just geo block all requests from countries and zip codes that do this. Users breaking the law would not be the problem of the organization making the OS. If they're not "offering" the OS in those zip codes, refuse all service, patches, updates, everything, they would not be legally responsible.

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[–] eleijeep@piefed.social 12 points 1 day ago (2 children)

I thought that the law hasn’t even passed yet? Why are distros so eager to show legislators that they’re on board for being regulated?

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[–] silverneedle@lemmy.ca 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)
[–] Matty_r@programming.dev 5 points 1 day ago (3 children)

I've started updating my own Arch install script to work with Artix instead. Hopefully have it done in a few days.

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