Discord began a worldwide rollout of age verification this week, placing every account into one of three groups: adult, teen, or unconfirmed. The company says it will decide mostly by looking at how an account is used.
Teens aged 13 to 17 will still be able to message friends and join servers that carry no age restriction. Message requests from people they don’t know will go to a separate inbox, however. Sensitive images will be blurred or blocked, and only friends and small mutual servers will be able to see a teen’s profile.
According to Discord, the system estimates whether an account belongs to an adult or a minor by weighing signals like the account’s age, the servers it takes part in, and its overall activity patterns. The company says the content of messages plays no role in that decision.
Users can check where their own account landed under Settings > Account Status.
Users who are placed in the wrong group, or flagged because their signals are ambiguous, can verify their age in several ways. The options include a credit card charge handled by Stripe (Discord says it never sees the card number), an age range already stored with the Apple App Store or Google Play, a Google Wallet ID, an on-device video selfie, an ID scan paired with a selfie, or a newer credential system the company calls AgeKey.
Discord co-founder and chief technology officer Stanislav Vishnevskiy wrote in a blog post that over 90% of users will never be asked to verify their age.
Discord is making the change now because age-assurance laws are spreading quickly across U.S. states and other countries. In July, a Texas court ordered the company to adopt the age-assurance system it already uses in the UK and to submit monthly progress reports to the state’s attorney general. Similar requirements are taking effect in Brazil.
Discord put the global rollout on hold back in February because people thought they’d all have to scan their faces and upload IDs. They were wrong about that, but the pushback was loud enough that Discord came back with a different plan built on account signals.
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