Discord’s Age Gate Sparks Privacy Backlash After Breach
The Electronic Frontier Foundation warns that Discord’s voluntary rollout of age verification—using an age-inference system for most users and forcing government IDs or facial scans via third‑party vendors for some—risks privacy, chilling effects, and misclassification, especially after a 2025 data breach exposed ID data. While Discord claims IDs aren’t linked to accounts and scans stay on-device, privacy risks persist given unreliable facial-age tech and limited audits. EFF urges stopping non-mandated age gates and offers guidance for users facing age gates.
