Age Verification for Gamepass?

Man of Honour
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17 Aug 2007
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Did anyone else get this email today?

At Xbox, we are committed to providing players with a safe and secure experience on our platform. In collaboration with the community, publishing partners, and industry regulators, we frequently iterate on our safety measures to ensure we are offering the safest player experience.
As part of our compliance program for the UK Online Safety Act and our ongoing investments in tools and technologies that help ensure age-appropriate experiences, we need you to verify your age so you can continue enjoying social features on Xbox.
Please feel free to disregard this email if you’ve already verified your age via the verification process.
We’re partnering with Yoti, a trusted, third-party identity verification provider, to give you a menu of options for how to securely verify your age. Starting early next year, age verification will be required for you to retain full access to social features on Xbox, such as voice or text communication and game invites. Until verification is completed, access to these features will be limited to friends only.
While choosing not to verify your age by early 2026 will limit your ability to use social features on Xbox, your previous purchases, entitlements, and gameplay history and achievements will not be affected, and you will still be able to play and purchase games. We encourage parents and caregivers of children or teens who use an Xbox console to set up child or teen accounts, which allow them to manage gaming activities like screentime, spending limits, privacy and
To maintain full capabilities of social features on Xbox, including messaging, chat, and game invites, please verify your age by going to <link removed>


I got this for my Gamepass account, I assume this is going to be along the same lines as the recent identification thing for naughty websites, providing identity images as proof of age etc. Sounds like it will be coming to gamepass too then early next year. I wonder if thats going to have an impact on the number of Gamepass users
 
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I'm not sure how many people would be bothered by needing to provide identification docs/images to have access to voice/text comms, but not having the ability for "game invites" might be the one which they wont want to do without
 
Lol. TBF if I needed that it wouldn't bother me using Yoti. In fact, a lot of the reaction to this stuff is hilarious from people who happily use things like Facebook and what not and yet have 'privacy concerns'. Horse bolted long ago.
 
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Got the email this morning, had a quick read and they are using a different third party to do the verification, can see this finally getting the 'general' public to take notice of just how bad the OSA is, as their kids will soon be moaning at them if they get blocked from playing games.
 
Received the email this morning. I probably won't take action on any of this until I feel it directly affecting me.
 
I received one, but given that it is from 'Xbox', and keeps referring to Xbox, which is a console I have never owned, I assumed that it was either phishing or didn't apply to me :p
 
Lol. TBF if I needed that it wouldn't bother me using Yoti. In fact, a lot of the reaction to this stuff is hilarious from people who happily use things like Facebook and what not and yet have 'privacy concerns'. Horse bolted long ago.
To be fair though, you dont have to upload an image of your driving licence/passport/etc to use facebook. (I think), I dont think I'd ever upload an image of my driving licence or passport just to be able to have invites on a game
 
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To be fair though, you dont have to upload an image of your driving licence/passport/etc to use facebook. (I think), I dont think I'd ever upload an image of my driving licence or facebook just to be able to have invites on a game

That is true but even so, I know I had to do it to open multiple bank accounts and I'm sure Yoti were used for Starling.
Im also pretty sure they don't store the images behind verification. I'm sure my ugly mug is on plenty of CCTV cameras already.

That said, I get the principle of it sucks, though if it keeps annoying kids off Comms that's always a bonus :D (not that I play Mp)
 
That is true but even so, I know I had to do it to open multiple bank accounts and I'm sure Yoti were used for Starling.
Im also pretty sure they don't store the images behind verification. I'm sure my ugly mug is on plenty of CCTV cameras already.

That said, I get the principle of it sucks, though if it keeps annoying kids off Comms that's always a bonus :D (not that I play Mp)
Hehe, my bank accounts were all opened over 30 years ago so I didnt need to provide photos of my id back then. No idea what Starling is.

You're right about your face being on loads of CCTV cameras, then again said tv cameras dont also have your name, home address, dob etc next to the image of your face. At least not unless CCTV has become more advanced than I know of ! :D

And to require that level of "identity" , just to be able to get/send a game invite on a video game seems a bit...OTT...to me. Tom Cruise will be wheeling out his minority report screen soon :)
 
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I wonder if this will extend to other things, we've got it for naughty websites , and now for games, wonder if it would be extended to things like having to provide age verification to watch a 15 or 18 movie on tv etc. Like having to upload identity proof for an 18 film on Sky/Netflix/Prime so on.
 
I find it really odd that the age verification only applies to social features & not game ratings. Don't get me wrong - I'm quietly glad as it means I can ignore it. But it seems weird that someone with an unverified account can, for example, play GTAV but can't send or receive game invites to anyone not on their friend's list.

Also I'm a bit disappointed that they haven't done what some other platforms have done & assumed accounts older than X belong to people over 18. My account is over two decades old.
 
I find it really odd that the age verification only applies to social features & not game ratings. Don't get me wrong - I'm quietly glad as it means I can ignore it. But it seems weird that someone with an unverified account can, for example, play GTAV but can't send or receive game invites to anyone not on their friend's list.
I am assuming that will be the next step, having to provide identity if you want to buy or play an 18 rated game.
 
*Clarkson meme"

Oh no..... Social features

Anyway. :cry:

Think I said it in the OSA thread, they aren't thinking it through that I get to avoid voice chat with randoms.
 
Annoyingly I think this is somewhat of a good thing for kids, But still feel like we're on the path to proving you have to be a good citizen with your face and credit score to be allowed to access to things.
 
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Annoyingly I think this is somewhat of a good thing for kids, But still feel like we're on the path to proving you have to be a good citizen with your face and credit score to be allowed to access to things.
be-a-good-d9xl66.jpg
 
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