Age assurance
Articles
Sep 12, 2023
Understanding age assurance in the Online Safety Act
The Online Safety Act covers a wide range of issues including minimising the risk of children seeing harmful and age-inappropriate content, removing illegal content like child sexual abuse material (CSAM), criminalising fraudulent and scam ads, and introducing age verification for certain online services. This blog looks at some of the age requirements in the Act and what this means for tech companies, adult sites, gaming companies, social media platforms and dating sites. What is the purpose of the Online Safety Act? According to the UK government, the Online Safety Act aims to make the UK ‘the safest place in
Articles
Aug 03, 2023
Effective facial age estimation: a privacy-preserving approach to age assurance
For platforms to deliver age-appropriate content, they need to know the age of their users. Age estimation technology can provide an inclusive and accessible solution. It’s possible to estimate a person’s age from a number of features, including their voice, face, palm or fingerprints. Some age estimation methods are very accurate. Others collect little or even no personal data. But very few can do both. When done to a high standard, effective facial age estimation can offer a high level of privacy and a high level of assurance. Age estimation in the real world Consider the following situation: a
Articles
Jul 11, 2023
Effective Age Verification: Going beyond reading a date of birth on an ID
Regulators around the world are recognising that more needs to be done to protect children from harmful content online. From the Age Appropriate Design Code and the Digital Services Act to the upcoming Online Safety Bill and California Age Appropriate Design Code, businesses are being required to have age-appropriate controls in place. But to do this, they need to know the age of those accessing their services. After all, if they don’t know someone’s age, they can’t protect them. This raises some important questions. How should companies verify the ages of their users? How can they ensure age verification is
Articles
Jun 22, 2023
Free Digital ID age checks
With so much of our lives spent online – we can chat to friends, watch our favourite shows, and expand our learning – it’s so important to make sure children are only accessing age-appropriate content. In the UK, the Age Appropriate Design Code (the ‘AADC’, also called the Children’s Code) will soon be complemented by the Online Safety Bill. In the US, California has passed its own version of the AADC which comes into force from 1st July 2024. An increasing number of US regulators are also bringing in legislation which requires social media and adult platforms to verify the
Articles
Apr 27, 2023
The Age Appropriate Design Code for businesses
The Age Appropriate Design Code (also known as the “Children’s Code”) is the first statutory code of practice for children’s data in the world. Introduced by the UK Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) in 2021, the set of standards seeks to ensure that online services are designed in the best interests of a child. “The best interests of a child” is a concept from the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC), which recognises that children need special safeguards and care in all aspects of their life. In a world first, the Code extends this protection to
White papers
Mar 30, 2023
Facial Age Estimation white paper
Making it faster and safer to prove your age Our age estimation technology accurately estimates a person’s age by looking at their face. We built it to give everyone a secure and private way of proving how old they are in different everyday scenarios: from age checking on social platforms and online stores, to supermarket self-checkouts, bars and clubs. This privacy-friendly approach to age verification doesn’t require any personal details or documents, and all information is instantly deleted once someone receives their estimated age – nothing is ever viewed by a human. Key takeaways from
