I have to give Fortnite my passport to use Bluesky

Summary

Before we get started, just a reminder that Spitfire News is currently having its first-ever SALE to celebrate hitting 10,000 subscribers! Get $10 off an annual subscription for a limited time! Or subscribe for free to get unpaywalled editions like this one. I’m from Ohio, which means around this time every year I’m there for the holidays. And unlike in New York City, when I get on Bluesky in Ohio, I can’t access my DMs unless I verify that I’m an adult. I still get notifications that people are messaging me on the platform, which I use daily for work, but I can’t see what they’re saying unless I hand over part of my social security number, my credit card information, my passport, or my driver’s license to a subsidiary of the video game company that makes Fortnite. Yes, that’s right. I have to let Epic Games check my passport or other highly sensitive personal data in order to DM people on Bluesky when I’m at my parents’ house. Here’s what that looks like on Bluesky. A screenshot of my Bluesky app prompting me to “complete age assurance in order to access this screen,” Bluesky’s attempt to comply with age verification laws in Ohio. Why is this happening? Well, to protect the children, of course! In late September, an Ohio law went into effect that requires websites that host content that could be deemed “obscene or harmful to juveniles” to block access using age-verification tools like the one owned and operated by Epic Games. This is supposed to target websites like Pornhub, which isn’t even complying, because the company doesn’t think the law applies to them as written. Ohio’s attorney general is threatening to sue them next year over it. But why would this affect Bluesky DMs? You can’t even send photos or videos over Bluesky DMs! Other platforms that are rife with obscene and harmful content, like Elon Musk’s X, have seemingly done nothing to comply with Ohio’s new law. And while the Bluesky community tends to lean pretty Gen X, it feels wrong that no one under 1...