Removing age reporting infrastructure may break applications that expect an age bracket signal. The short-circuit approach: replace the real implementation with a stub that always returns "unknown" (bracket 0). Apps get a valid D-Bus response. No age data is collected or transmitted.
This is the digital equivalent of /dev/null — a compliant interface
that does nothing.
As of March 2026, no Linux distribution has shipped an age reporting implementation, and
no application queries the org.freedesktop.AgeVerification1 interface. When
implementations ship and applications begin requesting age data, these stubs will be ready.
Three layers of short-circuiting cover the full range of Linux application packaging:
A minimal daemon that registers org.freedesktop.AgeVerification1 on the
system bus and responds to GetAgeBracket with 0 (unknown) for all users.
SetAge and SetDateOfBirth accept input and discard it
silently. Any application that queries the age bracket API gets a valid, well-formed
response.
Sandboxed Flatpak applications access system services through xdg-desktop-portal. If a
portal for age bracket data is added, we will provide a portal override that blocks access
or returns the "unknown" bracket. Flatpak's permission system already supports per-app
overrides via flatpak override.
AppImages run with the user's full permissions and can access D-Bus directly — the stub daemon handles this case. Snaps use AppArmor profiles that can restrict D-Bus access; we will document any cases where a snap's confinement profile grants access to the age bracket bus name and how to revoke it.
The removal and short-circuit approaches are designed to work in sequence:
Use the removal guides to uninstall the real age reporting implementation — package, service, data files, and all.
Install the stub daemon. It occupies the same D-Bus bus name, so applications see a working service. No code changes or application patching needed.
Use package manager holds, pacman hooks, or preseed directives to prevent the real implementation from being reinstalled by updates. The stub remains in place.