The Valve of the PC games giant has begun to bow before the United Kingdom online security law, demanding Steam users to verify their age with a credit card to access games with mature content.
“To access Steam Store pages for mature content games, as well as its associated community centers, you must log in to an active user account and explicitly opt through the account configuration page.” Steam support page details. “For users of the United Kingdom, this option requires age verification. Its UK Steam user account is considered verified by age during the time that a valid credit card is stored in the account.”
The online security law is derived from an objective to prevent children from seeing inappropriate, sexual or generally mature content in a myriad platforms and online services. As such, users of services and sites that house mature content, even if not exclusively, they must verify that they are 18 years old or more.
Often, this requires things like a facial scan or details of the credit card, that people centered on privacy could worry about separation with the given verification tools that can be delivered through third -party organizations with their own rules on the collection and use of data. In particular, a credit card is requested, since in the United Kingdom you need to be 18 years to request one.
“Having the credit card stored as a payment method acts as an additional deterrent element against avoiding age verification by sharing a single Steam user account among several people,” Valve said.
While I understand the need for such verification, and I hope you protect young people from some of the most unpleasant content that one can find online if it is inclined, as a 38 -year -old Steam user, it is a minor discomfort and another obstacle to launching when you log in to the game platform on different PC or devices.
It is also a bit annoying since there are still people who do not have credit cards; For example, I only obtained one that really uses last year.
Privacy protection
For people like me who can be a bit doubts about the delivery of credit card details, the Valve process is to store the credit card as a payment method, so it will not use a third -party verification service outside the platform, which should mean that the data of your credit card is kept safe.
“The processed data in the verification process are identical to those of the millions of other Steam users who make purchases or store their payment details for convenience,” said Valve. “Therefore, the verification process does not provide information on a user content preferences to payment providers or other third parties.”
So this makes me feel a little more comfortable with the whole matter and, hopefully, it should be a unique process. I have become accustomed to how easy it is to use Steam from the safe payment to logging through the mobile application, so I hope that this adaptation to the online security law does not erosion that feeling of ease.
It will be interesting to see if other countries follow the example of the United Kingdom or if Valve decides to implement this verification for all users and a unique window form to allow ‘safe’ access to mature content. I guess time will say it.
