The Electronic Frontier Foundation and allies argue that California's AB 1709, which bans social media for anyone under 16, will harm young people by cutting them off from communities and information rather than protecting them. The law also requires age verification that forces companies to collect more personal data from everyone.

• Social media bans are ineffective at protecting youth while denying them spaces to develop voices, share art, practice religion, and engage politically
• Age verification requirements will force companies to collect more data on all users, concentrating corporate power rather than protecting privacy
• The law disproportionately harms marginalized youth, including LGBTQ+ teens who rely on online communities for safety and connection unavailable offline

The article profiles Aevum, a developer SDK that uses zero-knowledge cryptography to verify user age on-device without storing identity documents, solving the regulatory pressure on apps to verify minors while avoiding privacy risks. It's positioned as a better alternative to traditional ID scanning because developers never handle personal data, yet still satisfy compliance mandates like COPPA.

• Apps face impossible tradeoffs: verify age or face legal liability, but traditional verification (uploading IDs, facial scans) destroys conversion rates and creates massive data breach targets
• Aevum generates cryptographic proof a user meets age thresholds directly on their phone using WebAssembly, with developers charging $0.03-$0.10 per verification and $499/month for enterprise tiers
• The moat comes from integration lock-in (replacing it requires re-architecting onboarding) plus cross-app identity reuse, where users verify once and get frictionless access across partner apps

New global regulations are forcing online platforms to verify user age, but existing solutions are clunky, privacy-invasive, and costly to build in-house. Verifai offers a developer-focused API that runs on-device selfie estimates and document checks, with pay-as-you-go, tiered subscriptions, and enterprise plans to simplify compliance and lower legal risk.

• New age-verification laws (France's minor bans, UK's Online Safety Act) are pushing platforms toward compliance solutions rather than risky in-house builds
• Verifai's developer-first API lets teams drop in selfie, document, or on-device age checks with pay-as-you-go and tiered pricing
• Running FairFace via TensorFlow.js client-side means only a pass/fail flag hits servers, avoiding biometric data storage
• Deep integration into onboarding/trust-and-safety flows creates high switching costs, locking customers in against rivals like Yoti or Persona