Can I ask you to explain your point, “age doesn’t matter, your digital footprint carries over?”

I... didn't say that? Not sure if you replied to the wrong person?

But I'll try to respond to what I can?

You mention solutions to protect yourself from the digital footprint carry over, but this law would just make it easier to overcome those solutions.

Assuming we are referring to the California legislature (I believe most/all of the US legislature if on the same grounds. The proposed EU "framework"s are very different), there is no requirement for third party verification.

It is literally the same check we already have. "Enter a random ass date that is more than 18 years ago". This doesn't "overcome" anything and, arguably, is a good law to get on the books so that you can say "Something is being done" before all the legislature and "frameworks" that want to be built around third party verification and "digital passports" do gain traction.

Now instead of having to figure out the various unique patterns of accessing the internet to determine info about you, you just tell them your age (or that you’re an adult, whatever) on those systems directly.

All of this is already happening and HAS already happened. You know all those stories about how google knows you are pregnant before you miss your first period? You know how you can quite often just click "verify you are human" and it processes without making you generate training data?

Hell, you know how targeted ads are a thing?

All of that is the same thing. It is about building profiles that tend to be so ridiculously specific that it isn't even "This user connecting from Norway actually lives in the US and is from Cleveland" and is more "Oh, this is Oswald Harvey using his nordvpn subscription that he got with a discount from a Spiffing Brit video. He tends to favor the endpoints that are 25% down the list"

I also think it’s a bit disingenuous to call ‘this is the first step towards something worse’ a slippery slope when that is exactly how the creeping erosion of privacy has gone in the US historically, but especially the last few decades.

1. This is not exclusive to the US. This is something being pushed globally.
2. I never said this is "the first step towards something worse". That step happened LONG before programming computers was "women's work" and the cray loveseat was a genuine accomplishment

Both of which speak towards why people need to educate themselves to understand what information is already out there.

You acknowledge that a lot of people don’t fully understand how to protect themselves (and offer solutions that require more money, time, and education to accomplish) and in the same breath that is why it’s okay that we make data collection easier.

Yes? I am sorry that protecting your privacy takes effort? I am sure that if you pay a random sponsor on an LTT video that they'll claim to do everything for you?

Like... I really don't know what to tell you?