Decentralized social network Mastodon says it can’t comply with Mississippi’s age verification law
— the same law that saw rival Bluesky pull out of the state
— because it doesn’t have the means to do so.

The social nonprofit explains that Mastodon doesn’t track its users,
which makes it difficult to enforce such legislation.

Nor does it want to use IP address-based blocks, as those would unfairly impact people who were traveling, it says.

The statement follows a lively back-and-forth conversation earlier this week between Mastodon founder and CEO Eugen Rochko
and Bluesky board member and journalist Mike Masnick.

In the conversation, published on their respective social networks, Rochko claimed,
“there is nobody that can decide for the fediverse to block Mississippi.”

(The Fediverse is the decentralized social network that includes Mastodon and other services, and is powered by the ActivityPub protocol.)

“And this is why real decentralization matters,” said Rochko.

Mastodon says it doesn't 'have the means' to comply with age verification laws | TechCrunch

Decentralized social network Mastodon says it cannot comply with age verification laws, like in Mississippi and elsewhere, and says it's up to individual server owners to decide.

TechCrunch (techcrunch.com)