Discord exidus

This was copied directly from the discord policy page. To me it just seems to affect the UK. Q: Is Discord introducing mandatory age verification or ID checks? A: The United Kingdom's Online Safety Act (“OSA”) introduces new responsibilities for online platforms to reduce safety risks and provide age-appropriate experiences for users, especially teens. In compliance with the UK OSA, all new and existing UK users will be assigned updated default settings. These defaults include automatic content filtering (which is already enabled for teens everywhere) to reduce the likelihood that teens encounter certain types of potentially harmful content, as well as different social settings. UK users who wish to access content flagged by our filters or customize those settings can do so only after verifying that they are 18 or older through our new privacy-forward age verification experience. Our new privacy-forward age verification experience is required in specific scenarios that meet the OSA’s requirements, while building on our commitment to fostering genuine connections and a positive online experience. Check out our Safety Center article to learn more about why we are making these changes due to the UK OSA. Age verification is currently only available to UK users. For more info, please visit our Help Center article. ‍

If you don't age verify, your account will be demeaned a teen account and the following restrictions will apply. Mature and graphic images will be permanently blocked Age-restricted channels and servers will be inaccessible DMs from unknown users will be rerouted to a separate inbox Friend requests from unknown users will always produce a warning popup No speaking on server stages

None of what was listed affect me either way lol. I don't really do anything on Discord, I just stick with my little group and that's that.

How I understood it was it was either going to require you to submit a video selfie of yourself or a picture of your photo ID to prove your an adult otherwise your existing account would be reduced to a "teen" account which has certain restricted features the full "adult" account has access too. This is at least in the US. Needless to say this has received a lot of blowback with many users canceling Nitro and especially after Discord had a hacking incident back in October so no one really trusts them to protect any personal data even if discord claims none of this info will be kept by them. It sounds like they've walked some of it back so we'll have to see how it actually impacts everyone still using the platform.

Even if it doesn't immediately make Discord impossible to use it's a sign of the worst to come. That plus the data leaks makes me want to switch off the moment it becomes too common.