Technology explainer
How Can Online Platforms Estimate a User’s Age?
An explanation of age assurance methods, their error rates, privacy tradeoffs and the role of independent testing.
Online services can estimate age from account history, device signals, documents, payment records or a face-based estimate. Each method trades convenience against privacy and accuracy. Good systems combine signals, provide appeals and publish independently tested false-positive and false-negative rates rather than promising perfect identification.
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