- The CEO of Reddit has been talking about verification
- Face ID or Touch ID could be used to prove you’re human
- Nothing has been decided or implemented on Reddit yet
Reddit has a serious bot problem, and CEO Steve Huffman has been talking about ways that it could prove that posts are crafted by humans – including the possibility that Face ID and Touch ID verification could be required.
Huffman made the comments in an interview with TBPN (via Engadget), while discussing the idea of making Reddit more valuable for its users, and opening out the platform to people who haven’t used it before.
“The most lightweight way [to verify a user is human] is with something like Face ID,” Huffman said, before going on to mention more “heavy” options such as ID checking services, and other alternatives in between.
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Reddit is looking at passkey technology in general, Huffman said: “They actually require a human presence. A human has to touch, or do, or look at something. That actually just proves that there’s a person there, or gets you pretty far.”
‘We do want to know you’re a person’
Reddit CEO Steve Huffman says that while there are legit types of AI content on the platform, the company is considering Face ID and other passkey verification methods — among other options — to ensure there’s a human behind each prompt while allowing users to stay anonymous: pic.twitter.com/Erv2jfj9QuMarch 20, 2026
Huffman also said the internet as a whole needs better third-party tools for verifying that someone is a human being, without having to require any kind of ID and without impinging on the privacy and security of users.
Reddit isn’t the only online platform struggling with an influx of automated bots, especially with the rise of generative AI to power them. We’re getting to the stage where bot traffic is overtaking human traffic on the web.
While platforms such as X and Facebook seem okay with AI-generated content being posted for the masses, it’s something Reddit is keen to crack down on – while also respecting the anonymity of its users.
“Part of our promise for our users is we don’t know your name but we do want to know you’re a person,” Huffman said. “It’ll be an evolution for us for a while, and probably every platform to find the right middle ground here.”
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