The UK has activated age verification requirements under the Online Safety Act, but the rollout has been rocky—Discord is dealing with significant fallout while gaming platforms struggle to balance compliance, user privacy, and community experience.
A high-scoring r/pcgaming post cites a PC Gamer report that TeamSpeak saw an “incredible surge of new users,” with hosting capacity reportedly maxed in several regions including the US. The report links the shift to renewed user concern around age-verification and privacy discussions in Discord markets.
Discord is facing privacy concerns after changing its data handling vendor for UK age verification, with users calling it a 'privacy bait-and-switch.'