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Is an under-16 ban on ham radio next?

Both the National and Labour parties here in New Zealand have announced their support for a ban on under-16s (U16) having unfettered access to the internet and the social media websites that proliferate there.

Although I've already published a column on this topic earlier this week, it's time for a little more commentary from me and a bit of a warning.

Whilst this has been billed as a measure designed to protect children from the evils of social media, many have already twigged to the fact that it's far more about sneaking a digital-ID system in the back door.

How do we know this?

Well the most important part of implementing any age-gating online is being able to accurately determine the age of the user. How can you do this without submitting some form of official identification document, a document that then effectively allows 24/7 monitoring of all your online activity.

Although National has claimed that people won't have to submit ID to prove their age, you can bet your bottom dollar that six-months after implementation they'll suddenly decide "Oh, the technology we were relying on isn't working as well as we thought so if you want full access all you'll have to do is just upload your driver's licence, passport or other official ID".

None of this is new, it's all been discussed at length in countries which have already gone head with U16 age-gating, such as Australia and the UK.

The reason for today's column is something a little different which only occurred to me yesterday.

I was reading some stuff online and came across a post from a 13-year-old in the USA who'd taken up the hobby of ham radio. This was a young girl and she was extremely excited by the fact that she'd just obtained her full licence, not just the technician's one.

The full licence opens up a much larger world for ham operators, granting them access to frequencies that more easily span the globe. This is the internet we had before we had the internet.

That got me thinking...

If we age-gate social media, as we're bound to do, will kids turn to amateur radio instead?

I can imagine a whole new generation of CB and amateur radio users popping up. These are the kids who still crave the buzz associated with chatting to someone a long way away, safe behind the firewall of an electronic medium.

To be honest, this would be great. Imagine a whole new generation upskilling themselves on the theory and practice of electronics. That'd be an asset to the entire nation.

However, if our lame-brained politicians are to believed, we'd have to age-gate access to CB and ham radio too -- wouldn't we?

After all, the reason given for age-gating the internet is to protect our vulnerable children from anonymous interactions with their peers and (even worse) adults.

Surely this is exactly what CB and ham radio would allow, as it has done for decades already.

Of course the government of the day won't propose age-gating CB or ham radio because the whole "let's protect the children" narrative is a false one that has been created in order to slide that digital-ID mandate in the back door.

Of course I could be wrong and perhaps government will be 100 percent consistent by age-gating radio communications. And pigs might fly.

Carpe Diem folks!

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