TECH Signal 398
EU Age Verification Project Mandates Hardware-Bound Attestation
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For developers building on open platforms, this requirement means that even with open-source code, real-world access depends on approved hardware, operating environments, and a European Commission list of compliant apps. The architectural choice creates a tension between the project's open-source licensing and the practical reality that only devices with specific secure hardware and approved software stacks can serve as native wallets.
Written by elseif from the cluster below · every claim links back to a sourceThe three things worth knowing
Hardware-bound attestation is a mandatory architectural requirement, not an optional implementation detail, meaning credentials must be tied to protected hardware like Android TEE, StrongBox, or Apple Secure Enclave.
Proof of Age providers will only issue credentials to apps on a European Commission-maintained list of compliant apps, so publishing source code does not guarantee a community-built version can access the real service.
While stricter checks like root detection, Google Play Integrity, and Apple App Attest are not universally mandated by the reference implementation, individual deployers may enforce them, leaving uncertainty about how restrictive production deployments will be.
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