Bluesky rolls out age verification in the UK to comply with the Online Safety Act; users under 18 or opting out of age verification will have limited accounts
The Online Safety Act has unleashed an unregulated market in age verification. — That we have to do these intrusive checks with countless providers for different platforms is dangerous. — www.theverge.com/news/704468/ ... @toofthey : you need your face & ID scanned then uploaded into an (likely hacked in the future) online database because your neighbor Brenda uses an iPad & unrestricted internet access as her child's babysitter but is afraid they'll see something too faggoty — www.theverge.com/news/704468/ ... Iain Roberts / @slowbikeiain : Imagine the shame and humiliation if the age verification database is hacked and you're outed as a Bluesky user Allie Nickell / @alliethinks : Can't find a post from Bluesky about this, but according to their blog, UK users will have to verify their age to keep using the full service, & this will be coming into force later this month. Will require (a) facial scan, (b) uploading ID or (c) payment card verification, via a third party site. Ali / @alisonrossiter : This will be the end of Bluesky for many, privacy dies. — The UK gummint's authoritarian tendencies are out of control. — bsky.social/about/blog/0... Owen Boswarva / @owenboswarva : ID/age verification for UK users coming to Bluesky imminently bsky.social/about/blog/0... Yes, Bluesky are only complying with the law. But nobody is forcing them to iterate the UK Government's narrative. — #OnlineSafetyAct #onlineharms #openweb #censorship [image] Bator Tay / @batortay : I understand and agree people are reluctant to verify their age using their face or ID, but this mentions using a credit/debit card to verify and I don't see how that's different to any other website that stores card details. Is there anything I'm missing with that part? — bsky.social/about/blog/0... Maya / @mayaofspring : 1. slightly baiting, note “we'll make adult-appropriate content inaccessible, and we'll disable features like direct messaging” bsky.social/about/blog/0... 2. nevertheless, I'm getting impatient* for the inevitable resounding collapse of the UK state ideology [embedded post] @nudistmom : For the U.K. users in our community. Know that this is a first step on this platform to ban porn. Not that Bluesky itself is oppose to porn, but the hoops that governments will require them to go through will be a hassle. — It's coming to the U.S. too. Mark my words. — www.theverge.com/news/704468/ ... @socialmedialab.ca : Bluesky is rolling out age verification in the UK to meet the requirements of the Online Safety Act, chipping away even more at what little anonymity users had to begin with. www.theverge.com/news/704468/ ... But it's not just Bluesky. All platforms will have to comply. @billyb0ner : not my usual sort of post but I'm not really sure what is going to happen with this. 🧵 — I will say off the bat that I don't really feel comfortable uploading my ID to continue to post/view explicit content on bluesky so hopefully this can be circumvented with a VPN for now. Dell Cameron / @dell : wonder how UK users feel about a US company doing the verification [embedded post] @threetails : UK folks: it has already been openly admitted that age verification can be bypassed with a simple VPN. If you do ANY kind of activism you should already have a VPN set up and even if you don't, it's a good idea. Alan Rew / @alanrew : Lots of people falsely concluding from this post that it applies to *all* users. — It doesn't. — It *only* applies to those who try to view content that Bluesky has decided is pornographic. — Here's the Bluesky announcement — bsky.social/about/blog/0... [embedded post] @pelokwin : If this happens in America, I'm out. We don't need social media, it needs us. I don't trust companies/corporations, nor any government. Fuck your “ if you do nothing wrong you have nothing to hide” bullshit — @bsky.app @thejemster : Using pet pics to distract people from your recent bend-over for fascism, are we? — www.theverge.com/news/704468/ ... [embedded post] Tristan Gray / @eidyngray.scot : Noticing some doomer takes on this so to be clear - — BlueSky will gate some features behind the check and it's being implemented across literally all social media sites. — You won't lose your account if you don't do this. You will lose access to DMs. — www.theverge.com/news/704468/ ... @dreadships : The UK is getting age verification to stop you viewing dirty french postcards like this [image] @gateklons : Well... That's not the decentralized social media outcome I would want. Decentralization should come with a greater capacity to resist or circumvent this bullshit. [embedded post] Tyler King / @tyleraking.com : On an unrelated note, some good VPNs are: — ExpressVPN: link.express-vpn.app/PxoJ/1b6b246g — Mullvad: mullvad.net/en — Proton: protonvpn.com [embedded post] Cathy Gellis / @cathygellis : Blame the UK govt, not Bluesky. These age verification laws are BAD. — They should not be possible in the US, where we have a First Amendment to protect the expressive interests being harmed, but the state and fed govt keeps trying to pass these laws, and now SCOTUS is starting to let them... … James / @james.claims : This is UK Law, so it is not like Bluesky are choosing to do this off their own back. But it is not nice to have to give my identity. — Interestingly, when reading the original law way back when it was suggested that verification could be done through email addy. I guess not. Courtney Love Actually / @hexadecibelle : hope the UK government is also setting up better privacy laws and creating an independent org for helping people hurt by verification scams and identity theft Jennifer R. Povey / @ninjafingers : Bluesky has two choices: — 1. Age verification in the UK. — 2. Ban all sex workers and NSFW content, broadly defined, from the site. Ari Cohn / @aricohn.com : Now is the time to focus HARD on the protocol and create instances run by people unwilling to give into this nonsense. [embedded post] @lamentablyawake : Not subtweeting anyone but it's interesting that a lot of very online people are surprised mandatory age verification is coming in for everyone in the UK on July 25th. — If the porn ban is surprising for very online people the regular population is going to be absolutely blindsided. Mike Stabile / @mikestabile : Starting July 25, Bluesky will require users in the UK to scan their face, upload an ID or verify their identity with a bankcard. — I realize that platforms feel they have no choice but to comply with the government surveillance schemes, but shocking nonetheless. Mastodon: @catileptic@chaos.social : How about having a society in which toxic content and violent behaviour is discouraged, called out and prevented? Where we show up online to support those who are hurt. Where we feel a sense of responsability for helping folx navigate nuanced ideas and interactions in a way that doesn't patronize them but instead supports their innate curiosity. … Thomas / @thomasfuchs@hachyderm.io : If you read the “Bluesky requires IDs now” post: 1. This only applies to UK users. [1] 2. It's because the UK is building a surveillance state that requires websites and apps to do this, not because Bluesky is evil. [2] 3. It's either that or shut down in the UK. Whether you like it or not, this also affects Mastodon—and even personal blogs with comments enabled. [3] Adam Dalliance / @pre@boing.world : Age verification via uploading ID or face-scan or credit-card coming to UK Bluesky users. — I will be doing none of these things, obviously. — Apparently they're gonna block DMs and “adult” content somehow for people who nope out of such things. Interesting that they think that will be okay by the law. … Your Old Pal Lewie / @Lewie_Kong@retro.pizza : I imagine there'll be an influx of Brits on Mastodon in the coming weeks. — https://www.theverge.com/... Blake C. Stacey / @bstacey@icosahedron.website : So, with Bluesky imposing age verification requirements on their UK users, how is the UK's Online Safety Act going to impact fedi? — https://www.theverge.com/... Forums: r/privacy : Bluesky is rolling out age verification in the UK r/unitedkingdom : Bluesky is rolling out age verification in the UK r/ukpolitics : Bluesky is rolling out age verification in the UK
Context & Ripple Effects
Bluesky’s move places a social platform inside a widening access-control regime: related coverage also documents Australian rules requiring age checks for logged-in search users, showing that age assurance is spreading across consumer internet services rather than remaining confined to a single category. Australia’s logged-in search age-check rules
The policy also exposes the operational trade-off for smaller services. Later related coverage shows Bluesky revising its rules across several jurisdictions and, separately, blocking Mississippi rather than meet a broad verification requirement—evidence that compliance capacity can determine where a service remains available. Bluesky’s cross-jurisdiction policy revision
First-order effects
- UK users must verify through a third-party flow using a facial scan, government ID, or payment card to retain full account access; minors and people who decline verification lose features including direct messages and adult content.
- Bluesky assumes a new compliance and user-trust burden around collecting age signals while enforcing different account permissions in the UK.
Second-order effects
- Age-verification vendors become an added dependency for Bluesky and similarly regulated platforms, while users face another identity-check decision before accessing mainstream social features.
- Restrictions create an incentive to test workarounds; related coverage documented UK users using VPNs, fabricated AI IDs, and game-character images to evade checks, raising the enforcement burden beyond simply adding a verification screen. reported attempts to evade UK age checks
Third-order effects
- If jurisdictions continue to impose distinct verification rules, platform access may increasingly vary by location and by a company’s ability to fund compliance; Bluesky’s later Mississippi withdrawal illustrates that endpoint. Bluesky’s Mississippi access block
- The longer-term contest is likely to be over whether age assurance can become a trusted, interoperable layer across services without making identity collection a recurring condition of participation online.
The trend: Age-safety regulation is turning identity and age assurance into core platform-access infrastructure, with compliance capability increasingly shaping product availability by market.