Posted on 07/31/2025 8:29:52 AM PDT by Drew68
YouTube on Tuesday announced it’s beginning to roll out age-estimation technology in the U.S. to identify teen users in order to provide a more age-appropriate experience. The company says it will use a variety of signals to determine the users’ possible age, regardless of what the user entered as their birthday when they signed up for an account.
When YouTube identifies a user as a teen, it introduces new protections and experiences, which include disabling personalized advertising, safeguards that limit repetitive viewing of certain types of content, and enabling digital well-being tools such as screen time and bedtime reminders, among others.
These protections already exist on YouTube, but have only been applied to those who verified themselves as teens, not those who may have withheld their real age. For instance, in 2023, YouTube began limiting repeated viewing of videos that could trigger body image issues or those that display social aggression. The company has also been developing digital well-being tools since 2018.
If the new system incorrectly identifies a user as under 18 when they are not, YouTube says the user will be given the option to verify their age with a credit card, government ID, or selfie. Only users who have been directly verified through this method or whose age has been inferred to be over 18 will be able to view the age-restricted content on the platform.
The machine learning-powered technology will begin to roll out over the next few weeks to a small set of U.S. users and will then be monitored before rolling out more widely, the company says.
The plans to introduce age inference technology were announced in February as part of YouTube’s 2025 roadmap. The plans are also the latest step in attempting to make YouTube safer for younger users, following the 2015 launch of the YouTube Kids app and the 2024 rollout of supervised accounts. The features also arrive as social media more broadly is coming under increased government scrutiny in the United States, where platform makers, including Apple and Google, have pitted their lobbyists against those from big tech companies like Meta over who’s responsible for age verification and children’s safety.
In the meantime, a handful of U.S. states have taken matters into their own hands, as over a dozen states have passed or proposed laws to regulate minors’ use of social media. Many of these require age verification or parental consent, including those in Louisiana, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Utah, Texas, Maryland, Tennessee, and Connecticut, among others. (However, some laws, like those in Utah and Arkansas, are blocked by litigation at this time and are not enforceable, while others are still pending implementation.)
The U.K. also began enforcing its own age-verification checks this week following the 2023 passing of the Online Safety Act.
YouTube isn’t sharing specifics about the signals it’s using to infer a user’s age, but notes that it will look at some data like the YouTube activity and the longevity of a user’s account to make a determination if the user is under 18.
The new system will apply only to signed-in users, as signed-out users already cannot access age-restricted content, and will be available across platforms, including web, mobile, and connected TV.
LOL! You all thought this was going to begin and end with PornHub?
Say goodbye to internet anonymity. This was the goal all along.
AI-
Algorithms-
.
Facelessness?
.
If They ain’t figured Me Out Yet
“THEY” are not A god.
It will also mean that you cannot see anything on YTube without logging in with an account. No more browsing.
Not only that, Youtube has these awful ads, as does everyone else in streaming, but the other day I was watching a nine minute clip of baseball highlights and got four ad breaks.
My grandson and his girlfriend were here the other day and the stuff they watch IMO is really bad and juvenile. People seeing how much cheese they can eat at once. They watch tons of Youtube. And these youngsters will find something else from the multi-media world in a second if YT messes with them too much.
Oh, there may be some defiance but let's be honest. Most are going to complain about it and then cough up their ID if that's what it takes to watch a YouTube video showing them how to replace the thermostat on their Maytag dryer.
I guess I’m glad I don’t get links to YouTube stuff that requires this.
Google makes you the product. Always has.
It’s All about Scamming...
I just got a call about
‘Extended Warranties’?
I’m old,cranky and fat Wallets,
My Maytag is Quarter Feed.
HUH?? Haven’t the Teens all gone to TikTok anyway?
YT does have some pretty good Free Movies and I have been on there as a registered User almost since it launched. My videos are either old classic rock music or home video from the early 90s so really doubt I would be mistaken for a Yout.
I would take it as a compliment probably.
Youtube doesn’t give much of a choice now. Some browsers automatically log you in. Especially Chrome. Duckduckgo has an alternate player that can bypass that feature 90 percent of the time.
So remember, kids, watch a few videos about prostate health and burial insurance before looking for nude stuff.
Now that you’ve give us your credit card how about you give $14 a month to go ad free.
I started using Brave browser. It's been great except for one day when YouTube stopped playing unless I would remove the ad blocker. The next day Brave updated to bypass whatever change YouTube made.
You haven’t been able to see certain content on YouTube without logging in for quite some time. Even older movies that contain nothing inappropriate at all but are “unrated” require a log-in.
YouTube has nude stuff?! I would think that would violate their so-called community standards.
For all the ads on streaming, I can deal with repetitive ads, but not when it’s an ad I hate seeing. On some shows you’ll get an ad for a freaky horror movie that plays every 10-15 minutes. Where are the ads that are just about laundry detergent or candy bars?
Can you give an example of something that requires a log in?
The reason I ask is that I mostly watch YouTube, refuse to create an account, and have yet to be told I can’t see something without logging in.
I have it, I just don’t use it. I use Chrome for speed and Duckduckgo for privacy.
Sure, but now simply logging in won't be sufficient if the algorithm thinks you're under 18.
I have YouTube on all of my devices. Phones, pads, computers, TVs, etc. I'm logged in to all of them through my Gmail address which knows my real age from when I set it up (even though I never provided any sort of identification).
My family all watch YouTube through my login. I watch my videos and my kids watch their videos. So my algorithm is everything from Cocomelon to South Park clips to electric guitar product demonstrations.
If YouTube, at any point, suspects my 1968 birth year might not be accurate, they're going to ask for ID. And I suspect we're all going to be asked for ID at some point until Google has all of us on file.
As I said up-thread, some may be defiant but most will comply out of convenience.
age-appropriate experience for teens on YouTube = page after page of CNN and MSNBC.
replace the thermostat on their Maytag dryer.
= = =
If you look up Maytag for a gas dryer, wait a day for the enviro-anti-fossil-fuel enforcers to show up.
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