Do the new online safety age checks on porn sites go far enough?

0:02Hi, I'm Charlie Duffield and welcome back to the Standard Podcast. If you're new here, hit follow and give us a rating. For all the latest news, head to standard.co.uk. Coming up later in the show, all the build-up to tonight's Oasis gig as the band returned to Wembley Stadium for the first concert there since 2009.

0:29But first, children in the UK should soon be better protected from viewing pornography as people will have to verify their age when trying to access porn sites in accordance with the Online Safety Act. Until now, users simply had to click a button stating that they're over 18 to access these sites. But the new age gate measures mean people will need to send a photograph of their ID, credit card details, or a photo of themselves. Here's Technology Secretary Peter Kahl speaking on BBC Breakfast. This is a big moment. In fact, this is probably going to be the biggest moment since the internet was created when it comes to keeping children safe.

1:09Under-13s should not be accessing social media. Under-18s should not be viewing any material which is hateful, pornographic, extreme misogyny, and any other kind of material which unfortunately to date has just been finding its way into the feeds of young people. Most children don't go looking for it. It has come and found them. But from today, that ends. Ofcom estimates that 14 million people watch online pornography in the UK and says that stricter AIDS checks will make it more difficult for children to find harmful material. Websites that ignore the new laws can be fined up to£18 million, or 10 % of their global earnings.

1:50Yet, online safety campaigners say the new rules do not go far enough to protect children. The Molly Rose Foundation was set up by the family of the British teenager Molly Russell, who took her own life in 2017 after viewing harmful content online. It's called for additional changes such as blocking dangerous online challenges and requiring platforms to proactively search for and take down depressive and body image-related content. Here's the CEO of the Molly Rose Foundation, Andy Burrows. Today is a step forward, but it's not the giant stride that we needed. Ofcom has shown timidity rather than the ambition that was needed.

2:29For us, we've always had a very clear test for the Online Safety Act. Will it prevent further deaths like that of Molly Russell? And unfortunately, because these measures don't go far enough, we know that preventable harm experienced by teenagers in this country will only continue. And joining me now is the cybersecurity expert Chelsea Jarvie. Chelsea, can you tell me a bit about your work? I'm Chelsea Jarvie and I'm a cybersecurity expert. I've been working in the cybersecurity field for around 10 years. But I'm also just completing four years of PhD research into online age verification. So I've been looking at how can we anonymously tell whether somebody online is an adult or a child without needing ID or photos or biometric information.

3:17So what are your initial thoughts about this news? I think it really is a step in the right direction for online safety. However, there are things around trust. I don't think the adult population really trusts the measures, trusts the tech. And there's a lot of chat online around how to circumvent the need to do online age verification among the adult population. So I think we will soon see how effective it is. But if Ofcom said it's to stop children from stumbling across porn and adult content, it will likely stop that. It's a really divisive topic because people are concerned about their privacy, their security, their right to anonymity online.

4:00Because in cyber, we always talk about it's not if, but when you're attacked. But then in online age assurance, we're saying, we have us your ID. the companies just now that are offering age verification solutions do have security and privacy built in, but it just is different from what people are seeing in the media when we're seeing big retailers hacked. And there's a lot of information in the public domain about cyber security at the moment. So I can understand the feeling of unease among the public around putting ID information in to access adult content. But it's just, are we doing enough to make people trust that technology and trust that everybody's trying to do the right thing.

4:39I'm not sure we've really got that messaging out clearly enough. Could this be open to abuse from AI, for example? So there are a lot of countermeasures in place at the moment. The technology companies doing age verification have liveness checks in place and they're already looking at how to prevent AI from getting around the control. So I think there is work definitely in that place. But similar to cybersecurity, it's always this continual race of trying to keep on top of people getting around the technology and finding new loopholes. So this industry will be no different and it will just be that continual cat and mouse game of evolving the technology to make sure that it is still effective at keeping children safe, while also protecting the security and privacy and data of adult users as well.

5:30The technology secretary, Peter Carl, said this is the biggest moment since the internet was created. What do you make of that? It is pivotal from a regulation perspective and putting in policy, which is putting children's online safety first, because we've seen children come to harm. And there's some tragic stories of what have happened to families and children because of a lack of online safety measures. It's an important day. But I think we have to wait and see whether the impact of it is truly seen on the ground. the reality of how it actually works and how it embeds, I think we still need to wait and see how that plays out.

6:09Finally, do you think these measures go far enough? I think there's definitely more to be done. And one of my concerns and things I've looked at over the course of my PhD is the internet is so dynamic. It's dynamic content, it's algorithm based, we've got dynamic ads, whereas the age checks that we have just now are very static. There are a variety of online checks available for users at the moment. So whether you want to do facial age estimation and get the camera to take a photo of your face and we estimate what age you are, or there's open banking, there's a digital wallet. So there are a variety of different options and ways to prove adulthood.

6:50But that doesn't take into account shared devices. It doesn't take into account whether a child is using an adult's device or on an adult's account and so that change in behaviour isn't really monitored and the age check isn't redone unless the platform chooses to then do another age check so I think the one and done static point in time age check does have a place but whether it will continue to be something that's useful and something that is helpful to really prevent online harm to children. I'm not sure, particularly with us just being continually fed algorithmic content. We're continually fed things that keep us hooked on platforms.

7:34So if that age check wasn't right, or we have a different user, and we think they're over 18 and they're not, then how do we account for that right now with the technology that we have? I'm not sure. There's more to be done to really be more dynamic and have better controls to protect children throughout their internet journey and have them be served more age-appropriate online experiences based on dynamic age checks. Let's go to a break. Coming up in part two, it's just a few hours until Liam and Noel Gallagher arrive at London's Wembley Arena for their reunion tour. We'll see you back here in just a moment.

8:18welcome back

8:30now it's the most anticipated gig of the year and excitement is building as liam and no gallagher are set to play the first london show of their oasis reunion tour tonight at wembley stadium The Gallagher brothers may have been born in Manchester, but they made their adult lives in and around North London. People have already started queuing for tonight's event, with fans arriving from around the world. Here's what some of them had to say. How much have you spent on tickets in Taito? Too much. Obviously I went to a lot of the Oasis gigs back in the day, and I've waited a lot longer than this and been a lot further back so yeah today seems like it's gonna be good buzzing to get down the front and see him for the first time in 16 years.

9:17Absolutely buzzing, I've seen Liam a handful of times, lucky enough to meet Noel very quickly, got his signature but no absolutely amazing, you know generational dads and lads as they say but yeah you know Where have you travelled from this morning? The third concert I see. I was in Cardiff for the first date, in Manchester, the second, and that's the third one. Any tears expected tonight? Yeah. I think you're not true to yourself if you don't have a little tear in your eyes at some point. And the Standards Head of Culture, Martin Robinson, is here with me now. Martin, we chatted the other week when you were in Cardiff for the first Oasis reunion gig.

10:02Did it live up to the hype? It did. It was tremendously exciting. It was the first time anyone had seen them back on stage for all those years. So it was a very kind of emotional moment. Just a real thrill to see the brothers back together on stage. They were actually holding hands. They held hands and raised them to the sky and hugged at the end, which is very, very unlike them. It was incredible. The music sounded phenomenal as well. It could easily have been an exercise in just playing the hits and going home, but it really sounded big and exciting. The entire occasion was just great and people were going absolutely crazy.

10:39It was quite something. I'm going tonight to see them at Wembley and it's going to be interesting to see if it's as exciting as that. And what's the significance of them now playing in London? Yeah, them playing at Wembley, it's a big deal. It is the national stadium. It's always a touchstone for any band. So they're playing seven nights there over the summer, which is an enormous kind of deal. I think they'll be very much up for it. I mean, they played their hometown gigs in Heath and Park right to this, which was another big moment. But there's something about Wembley that's special. They're football fans as well.

11:11There's all that history there. But also, I think Wembley's an interesting one in the band's history as well. They've had ups and downs. They famously had their lowest moment ever, according to Noel, when I think it was 2001, when Liam came on stage absolutely blind drunk, was swearing at the crowd, and it was just a bit of a disaster. So I think there's probably a little bit of unfinished business, perhaps. They played again after that, but I feel like they've got something to prove on these shows in particular. So I think there's going to be an extra sort of edge there for these ones, and I don't think they're going to disappoint, put it that way.

11:45Have they got into much trouble so far on their tour? No, it's been very quiet on that front. So usually Oasis tours, there's lots of acrimony and falling out. Back in the day, there'd be insults hurled on stage and always be something. But the story of this one so far is that they seem to be getting on incredibly well. So some of the behind the scenes footage that's been released, that fans have seen and that the band have released, has kind of shown them that first night when they held hands and had a bit of a hug. It was a bit awkward. Since then, it's been noticeably warmer between them. There's been pictures of them sort of laughing and joking as they're going on stage, the same while they're on stage.

12:25And it genuinely feels like they're actually getting on, which is obviously a first for the Gallagher brothers. That's a story in itself. Whether they'll maintain this, I don't know. But for the minute, the shows are going without a hitch. They're delivering it. I would imagine just the sheer rush of being in front of that many people and getting the response that they're getting must you know you can't be human and not respond to that they must be absolutely thrilled and delighted with how well it's going that's clearly going to help with them sort of getting along a little bit better from what i understand they're not drinking or anything like that they're not going back to those old ways which i imagine would help as well this is a professional big big tour with a lot riding on it so they're all very nicely behaved thanks very much i mean we'll see what happens tonight it could all change at the moment but right now it's all hunky-dory.

13:14It's been an amazing summer for music in the capital. Would you say tonight is the pinnacle? I think so, with the nature of that band, the sheer number of gigs that they're doing, the amount of fans that'll be coming through the doors, there's figures out there with how much they're going to be helping the economy. This feels like the high point. I'm sure there'll be lots of Billie Eilish fans and pop fans who might disagree. In terms of sort of cultural impact, to the amount of tension that's on them. It feels like this is the big moment for anyone who's lucky enough to get tickets or rich enough to get tickets.

13:47They're going to have a great time. And I saw that they've released a new live track. Is that right? Yeah, they keep on doing this, just dropping in live tracks from some of the sets. So they release the slide away from one of the Cardiff shows and then cigarettes and alcohol from one of the Heaton Park shows, just dropping them on Spotify for people to listen to. I think also there's a degree of showing off because they sound absolutely fantastic. They've got a lot of guitarists on stage now and it sounds powerful. So I think they're also showing that they're delivering. That's kind of what that's about.

14:17But also just because they're not doing interviews and not saying anything, just like keeping fans going with these drops of little treats. Finally, is there anything else you want to add? There's some news from the stadium already this morning, which is that first 4 ,000 fans with standing tickets are going to be upgraded to front-standing tickets, which is pretty exciting. So that means they're going to be right down the front. I think there's extra reason for people to get there nice and early today, to make sure they get the prime positions. We'll be giving out the London Standard. We did a big cover on them this week, big pull-out post-the-specials.

14:51It's all getting really exciting. I can't wait to go down there later.

14:58And that's The Standard. For all the latest news, head to standard.co.uk. If you'd like to get in touch, please do drop us a line at podcasts at standard.co.uk. We'll be back here on Monday at 5pm. We'll see you then.