Overview
- A phased global rollout begins in early March for new and existing users, placing all accounts in restricted teen settings until they are verified as adult.
- Adults can verify using on-device facial age estimation via a video selfie or by submitting a government ID to vendor partners, with Discord saying selfies never leave the device and IDs are deleted quickly after confirmation.
- Unverified accounts will see sensitive content blurred, lose access to age-gated channels, servers and commands, have unknown DMs routed to a separate inbox, receive friend-request warnings, and be unable to speak on Stage.
- The expansion follows pilots in the U.K. and Australia and comes after an October 2025 breach at a third-party provider that exposed about 70,000 users’ ID photos, drawing renewed privacy concerns.
- Discord says some users may be asked to complete multiple methods, is developing a background age‑inference model to reduce checks, will keep verification status private, and is forming a Teen Council for product input.