Australia to enforce a "ratings system" on web, track users (was Re: [LINK] Has anyone seen this...)

[Scott Howard]

On 12/28/07, Daniel Rose <drose at nla.gov.au> wrote:
>
> > Mum has probably made Little Johnny a Secondary Card Holder anyway - and
> > Secondary card holders (which are as plentiful in Aus as kids with
> > mobile phones) can be as young as 16.
>
> Can you back your claim with numbers? I've never met or heard of a child
> who's a secondary card holder.



What about services like BOPO (http://bopo.com.au) and the other various
pre-paid credit cards?  Can a merchant differentiate between one of those
and a "real" credit card?

Correct.  A CC is not proof of age.  However, perhaps they are not so much
> trying to prove age as to prove identity, thus they are able to back-trace
> the scenario later if needed.


A Credit Card number doesn't even give that at the best of times, but
especially not if there's no actual charge being put onto the card.  I could
be using your credit card number/name for years without you having any idea,
and mobile phone cameras and the like makes getting such a number/name
absolutely trivial.

The US system of being able to confirm the billing address help here, but as
far as I'm aware there's no plans for such a thing in Australia.

  Scott.