• Aatube
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    9210 days ago

    This appears to be a direct consequence of a recent settlement with the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC), which had charged HoYoverse with deceiving minors into spending for their loot boxes. The Chinese developer was subsequently banned from selling them to users under 16 without a parent’s express consent, paid a $20 million fine to the FTC, and was also subject to the following stipulations:

    • Prohibited from selling loot boxes using virtual currency without providing an option for consumers to purchase them directly with real money;
    • Prohibited from misrepresenting loot box odds, prices and features;
    • Required to disclose loot box odds and exchange rates for multi-tiered virtual currency;
    • Required to delete any personal information previously collected from children under 13 unless they obtain parental consent to retain such data; and
    • Required to comply with COPPA, including its notice and consent requirements.

    @[email protected] @[email protected]

    • Jo Miran
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      4311 days ago

      The why is rarely argued. The how is always the point of contention. That’s why I am wondering what they are asking for age verification.

      • Ulrich
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        39 days ago

        Sure would be convenient if the US came up with some way to electronically verify IDs…

      • Aatube
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        610 days ago

        I don’t understand what you mean. They’re clearly requesting ages over 13 and disabling purchases for those under 16.

        • Jo Miran
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          38
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          10 days ago

          I am asking how will they verify the age?

          EDIT: I think you might be misunderstanding the grammar. I am not asking “what for”. “What for” = “why”. I am asking “what do they want as a form of age verification”.

          • @[email protected]
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            3110 days ago

            Yeah, if the end consequence is creating a giant database of photos of US ID’s (and storing which accounts theyre associated with as a nice bonus) then that is, in my opinion, not great.

            I understand Discord is already rolling out ID verification in the UK and their solution is to use a 3rd party service (you send them your, they just send discord a "is over 18? YES/NO). Personally I don’t think thats much better but it won’t be Discord’s own liability when they find out call center employees in India or Vietnam are using the images of your ID to sell online or something.

    • @[email protected]
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      910 days ago

      I don’t understand. For spending money one requires banking/card information. How children will get their guardian’s banking details without their consent?

      • Aatube
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        710 days ago

        Have you paid for things on mobile in-app? The operating system stores your info behind a password (or biometric) because adults (non-gambling as well) also hate having to memorize 16 digits flawlessly every time they needed to make payments.

        • @[email protected]
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          910 days ago

          I’ve refused to move my payment from password to biometrics purely because I’ll spend more if I don’t have to type out my 22 character password. A few times I’ve gone to buy something and seen the password field pop up and just like… uhh cbf.

          And then saved like $30.

          • @[email protected]
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            29 days ago

            I usually put limit on accounts or cards saved on device for everyday usage. I did the same for others in family too. Thanks to this my aunt lost only $25 when she got tech support scammed.

          • Aatube
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            310 days ago

            Some ancient internet slang you’ve got there.

            absorbs

            • @[email protected]
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              310 days ago

              You’ve made me reread my comment multiple times and I still don’t know what the ancient slang is. God I’m not even 30 and I’m already being made feel old lmao

          • Aatube
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            39 days ago

            Not everyone buys a separate device for their children or knows how to/can set up a user account.

            • @[email protected]
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              29 days ago

              Then why tf a game is responsible for their monetory loss? Children are susceptible to many more scams. And on top of that taking such privacy invasive ‘measure’ to solve it doesn’t make sense either. Children can even upload patent’s ids if parents are so careless anyway.

              • Aatube
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                18 days ago

                Regardless of who’s responsible, children should not be gambling. Why is everyone magnifying “responsibility”? Scamming children is illegal and having them gamble is/should also be illegal. I’ll also link you https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/comment/14325340.

                Children can even upload patent’s ids

                1. We don’t even know they’re gonna use IDs to verify. Steam just uses a birthdate dropdown to comply with legal things.
                2. No, it takes a lot more carelessness for children to be able to find parents’ IDs in the wild.
                • @[email protected]
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                  18 days ago

                  Scamming children is illegal. Solution isn’t banning children or requiring id to compromise others’ privacy too (who for example play without gambling). This whole thing is bs.

                  1. people store id in their phone most of the time.
                  • Aatube
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                    18 days ago

                    Again, this is gambling, and gambling is not scamming. What else do you propose to fix providing gambling services to children?

                    people store id in their phone most of the time.

                    No. Everyone Gen X and Y that I know of have passports in a cabinet and IDs in a wallet.

              • @[email protected]
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                49 days ago

                Damn, got 'em. Actually, they deserve to lose $16,000 while raising a gambling addict because they didn’t pull up their bootstraps and micromanage everything their preteen does in “that colorful game they play.”

                Mate, asking under-13s to get parent permission is provoking that good parenting you seem to care about anyway—what on earth is the problem?

                • @[email protected]
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                  19 days ago

                  Parental controls (or just not inputting card details into a phone the child has access to) is a fairly effective way to prevent the child spending the parent’s money without then knowing. Micromanagement is not typically considered good parenting; however showing interest in, and having some knowledge of, what your child spends significant time doing is.

                  • @[email protected]
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                    29 days ago

                    Do you have children and have you had to use parental controls for some games? The controls largely suck so much and just end up being a source of endless frustration. They are not what I would call effective.

    • @[email protected]
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      1310 days ago

      But the adults, they weren’t deceived in any way. Hoyo scammed them fair and square.

      Ban the entire business model.

      • Aatube
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        410 days ago

        No laws against that (lootboxing), yet, and I doubt EA doesn’t have their lobbyists against such laws if enacted. It’s also something that has existed so long as to become a cornerstone of mobile gaming… well, a cornerstone outside of the stupid Voodoo dot-io kind, anyways. While extremely unethical IMO I wouldn’t call it any more deceptive than any regular casino, that is.