Discord and ID verification, a tale
In an evolving story of Discord age verification, this weeks have been full of plot twist. Or more like message contorsion.
Chapter 1
On 20 February 2026, Discords Persona Age Verification Suffers Data Leak, Exposes Massive Surveillance System:
What’s worse than having one massive security incident associated with Discord? How about a second security incident.
That’s right. This incident comes after the one on October 2025. Persona, the company being this leak is also associate to Peter Thiel and Palantir. Probably the most evil corporation. Your privacy is valuable for them so they can sell it. It is also the same company behind LinkedIn ID verification.
And they claim in their ToS to retain data up to THREE years.
Chapter 2
The Local Stack went on with I Verified My LinkedIn Identity. Here’s What I Actually Handed Over:
I wanted the blue checkmark on LinkedIn. […] So I tapped “verify.” I scanned my passport. I took a selfie. Three minutes later — done. […] Then I did what apparently nobody does. I went and read the privacy policy and terms of service.
[…]
I scanned my passport for a checkmark. They ran a background check.
And all of that was sent to the same company, Persona. Also part of training data.
I came for a badge. I stayed as training data.
Read the post in details. If it doesn’t make you think twice if you ever wanted to get the LinkedIn badge, age verify with Discord, then there is nothing I can do here. I think the most efficient reaction here is to say no.
Chapter 3
The Rage reports that Hackers Expose Age-Verification Software Powering Surveillance Web:
Three hacktivists tried to find a workaround to Discord’s age-verification software. Instead, they found its frontend exposed to the open internet.
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Congrats on your operational security. It seems that you collect a lot of sensitive data but can’t even protect you source code. We alredy know the database was breached.
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The software demonstrate it is not “age verification” it is “identity verification”. Nothing surprising but this really provide the receipts.
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It shows it is a global surveillance system. They check ID and matching pictures against various databases. There don’t seem to be a different code path for Discord age verification. Why would you need to do that to verify the age?
All in all it’s a global surveillance system disguised as a privacy tool. It’s dangerous. It’s dystopian. It’s operated by the worst people on the planet. And full of planet burning chatbots.
Chapter 4
24 February 2026, 9to5Mac report that Discord just canceled its planned age verification rollout, for now:
Discord’s controversial age verification saga has reached a new turning point. The original rollout plan has officially been canceled, with a new plan and more user-friendly options coming later in the year.
So it’s not off the hook. It’s just shelved as Discord try to find a less controversial vendor (ie one that wasn’t caught yet) while they are trying to go to IPO.
I expect to come back with a vengence. I hope they bleed users.
Per the post, age verification will no longer be required in March. Instead, it’s being pushed to the second half of 2026.
March is also the target for the IPO.
Epilogue
I expect we’ll hear about this again. Remember, if your Government wants to implement age verification “to protect the children”, it’s to protect no one. It’s to implement a dystopian surveillance. If they wanted to protect the children, they’d do this effectively.
Previously: Age verification vs privacy