Hacker News Reader

Comment by iqanq | Hacker News Reader

You need a credit card to watch age-restricted videos on YouTube.

Sorry, which videos? I mean it really, I'm from EU and have never found one. To watch some videos I have to login but have never ever asked me for a credit card that I recall. I'd like to know.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0LBi1MHoaU is age restricted :)

Blaming the EU is a common escape strategy, but I don't believe it in the slightest. Mind, I wouldn't believe anything coming out of the modern Google except "we want to make tracking you easier so we can sell more expensive ads".

Edit: if the evil EU "forced" them to require a credit card or my ID to watch Samuel L Jackson saying "motherfucker", why hasn't the same evil EU forced them to make it easy to opt out of all tracking?

Wow.Thank you. I have not found one of these before. Only some that asked me to log in but no one with these restrictions , even if I used Google pay in the past, many years ago, is asking me for a credit card after logging in.

Example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5GDrJEGkVk

I suppose if you have verified your age in the past (for example if you bought something from the play store?) then you can watch the video freely. Try and watch it while logged off.

Thank you. I have not found one of these before. Only some that asked me to log in but no one with these restrictions , even if I used Google pay in the past, many years ago, is asking me for a credit card after logging in.

It's a Google thing, in some cases ( probably A/B testing), and it has nothing to do with the EU.

No, it's not a Google thing. It was mandated by the EU. https://blog.youtube/news-and-events/using-technology-more-c...

It should be noted that this is also the case in the UK today.

is this true? did not know this…

Absolutely not.

Google's support page says otherwise

https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/10070779?hl=en-GB#...

This says ...or a valid id.... ,which is a lot more common than a credit card.

Credit cards in the EU are not very prominent as a payment method, mostly for paying USA companies.

This is basically the same as the UK proposal which the Register article is talking about - that's also credit card or valid ID, they just chose to focus on the credit card part in the article.

When I said credit card I thought it was obvious I meant that debit cards are also acceptable. Turns out it wasn't!

Even if you include debit cards, you're still wrong.

You don't need anything. At all. According to Google, in case they suspect you might be lying about your age, they _might_ require age verification. This can be done with a credit card or an ID card.

So no, you don't need a credit card to watch age-restricted videos. You don't need a debit card either. You probably don't even need an ID card or anything at all.

You don't need to be of legal age to get a debit card, but you do for a credit card, hence why credit cards are often used as age verification.

A valid ID or credit card. So you don't need a credit card.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com