Re: Practical suggestions for resolving the Brazilian problem

I'm unsure if all those legislation initiatives will be implemented, 
anyway, what's about having a dirty hack to store age in the comment 
field of passwd? Something simple like below:

getage() {
     username="$1"

     pw usershow $username -7 |
         awk -F ':' '$5 {split($5, gecos, ","); print(gecos[5])}'
}

setage() {
     username="$1"
     userbirth="$2"

     gecos=$(pw usershow $username -7 |
         awk -F ':' '$5 {split($5, gecos, ","); printf("%s,%s,%s,%s,", 
gecos[1], gecos[2], gecos[3], gecos[4])}')"$userbirth"
     pw usermod $username -c "$gecos"
}

All the best,

Mike


On 3/5/2026 3:39 PM, vermaden wrote:
> The 'thesmartski' from X implemented some simple workaround:
> - https://x.com/thesmartski/status/2029116808066646416
>
> Regards,
> vermaden
>
>
>
> Temat: Practical suggestions for resolving the Brazilian problem
> Data: 2026-03-05 13:32
> Nadawca: "Vincent Bentley" <[email protected]>
> Adresat: [email protected];
>
>>> Originally posted to forum:
>> https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/practical-suggestions-for-resolving-the-brazilian-problem.101913/#post-748010
>>
>> I am not conversant in Portuguese so I don't know if this is already
>> being discussed on the Brazilian list. I apologise if this is already
>> being dealt with.
>>
>> On March 17, 2026 the Brazilian government will be enforcing a new law
>> that requires age verification of the users of a computer operating
>> system. This thread is to discuss how the FreeBSD developers could
>> resolve this problem within the next 11 days. Please add your own ideas
>> and pick apart any/all that have been posted.
>>
>> Summary in English
>> https://fpf.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/Issue-Brief-Brazils-Digital-ECA.pdf
>>
>> 1. Geo-block Brazil from image downloads and from pkg repositories.
>> This is an extreme solution that will alienate the Brazilian user
>> community, but it is the quickest to achieve given the lack of time.
>>
>> 2. Modify pkg so that it can accurately geo-locate by the public IP address.
>> If a Brazilian IP address is detected, pkg requests the email address of
>> a human installer over the age of 18 that is responsible for the system.
>> Pkg will no longer install or update until a token received by email
>> from [email protected] is entered into pkg.
>>
>> Pkg will also have to state on every execution that the FreeBSD package
>> repo is for 18+ users only and it is the responsibility of the system
>> administrator not to permit use of the system by minors. All existing
>> FreeBSD systems will remain usable in a pre-enforcement date state.
>> However, they will not be able to update until the sysadmin confirms to
>> pkg that the system is for 18+ users only. If the public IP address
>> changes, pkg will have to request a new authorisation token to continue.
>> This is the only way to deal with geo-locating dynamic IP or portable
>> systems that are travelling (visiting laptops).
>>
>> The authorisation token does not need to be individual to the machine.
>> A simple method of using a token matching the last 8-bits of an IPv4 or
>> IPv6 address is good enough. Every quarter, regenerate those 256 tokens
>> and save them on a private system area of the package repo. An already
>> authorised pkg will automatically rollover to the new token without
>> human intervention. Yes, someone could map the bit to token
> assignments
>> every quarter and publish them, but the new pkg program must save the
>> email address and display it every time pkg is run. Whoever runs
> package
>> will see the email address that was used to obtain the token.
>>
>> If a fake email address is used with published tokens, then the
>> Brazilian authorities have the problem of identifying the sysadmin and
>> the token publisher. The sysadmin becomes the criminal.
>>
>> Pkg gets updated every quarter to recognise the new set of 256 tokens
>> used by the FreeBSD repo. If pkg is used in Brazil without a valid
> token
>> it fails safe (legally, not functionally) by not updating and not
>> installing software until a sysadmin has submitted an email address to
>> receive an unlock token.
>>
>> If pkg is used against a private repo, such as a Poudriere built repo,
>> then no email address or token checking is required. Whoever operates
>> the Poudriere repo is the software distributor.
>>
>> -Vince-
>>
>>