Final July was the closing date for main digital platforms to adjust to the UK’s On-line Security Act (OSA). In an try to dam entry between minors and materials deemed ‘harmful’ by the federal government, platforms like Reddit, Spotify and X started harder age verification for its customers, comparable to facial scans and even authorities ID. On the prime of these stumbling to do so was Discord, whose system isn’t solely easy to game however not unimaginable to compromise, with one main safety breach exposing some 70,000 users’ ID shortly after. Now Discord is looking to enforce age verification globally. A agency Discord at one level labored with to take action could also be much more controversial than the choice itself.
Whereas the roll-out is aimed for March, PC Gamer reports that some Discord customers have already been prompted for brand spanking new age verification, this time utilizing the third celebration service Persona. Began in 2018, Persona develops id detection and anti-fraud applied sciences. They’ve been having an absolute subject day for the reason that OSA, being carried out to confirm consumer ID throughout Reddit and Roblox. One sticking level, nevertheless, is who’s backing the corporate: Peter Thiel, the cofounder of ICE-approved surveillance agency Palantir.
managed to catch it pic.twitter.com/Yyu0FaoDJ7
— Folf (@itsfolf) February 12, 2026
One among Persona’s greatest traders is the Founders Fund, valuing the corporate at $1.5 billion and rallying $150 million towards it in 2021. The Founders Fund started within the mid-2000s and made key early investments within the likes of SpaceX, AirBNB, OpenAI and Polymarket. All of your favourite tech issues “disrupting” the fashionable world. And who would unleash such a financial energy unto civilization? Why none apart from your pal and mine, the anti-humanist, anti-Christ awaiting Thiel.
Thiel, in fact, is thought for a lot of issues. A co-founder of PayPal, Thiel is now extra carefully affiliated with Palantir, an organization specializing in digital surveillance and exploiting consumer data. Palantir, named after the magic rock used to attempt to kill Frodo in Lord of the Rings, has been round since 2003 however has stored a lot busy these days. 404 uncovered how the corporate has been creating ELITE, an instrument to watch consumer data for the aim of conducting ICE raids. Elsewhere, the latest, huge disclosure of Epstein emails had reoccurring correspondence between the world’s most energetic consumer data dealer to the world’s most well-known intercourse trafficker. The 2 mentioned the lawsuit to end Gawker and how to best balkanize the planet.
Having the Founders Fund so near expanded information capturing throughout Discord, one of many extra personal locations to have a public dialog on-line, has made users a little itchy. The platform has not been totally clear the way it goals to quickly increase its age verification course of, stating a mixture of necessary scanning but additionally using existing user data to guesstimate if a consumer is of their 30s (which is nice information for everybody who communicates by way of Simpsons quotes).
In an official update, Discord recommended customers who encountered prompts from Persona are a part of ‘an experiment’ and that the data will solely be saved for seven days. How the tech will likely be utilized in the long run is but to be identified. When requested for remark, Discord instructed Kotaku its work with Persona was a part of a “limited test” which has since been concluded.
Regardless, I’ll see you on the boards.
