The Brits have really ramped up regulations to their pornography industry in recent years. The United Kingdom’s communications regulator, Ofcom, has opened an investigation into Pornhub’s age verification system,after finding that children may still be able to access the site despite its new safeguards. The investigation focuses on Pornhub’s parent company, Aylo, and its use of Apple’s age verification processes, which the company adopted after temporarily blocking new UK users in response to the Online Safety Act. Ofcom claims that some of its own checks indicated that children could still access pornographic content. The UK’s Online Safety Act makes pornography providers responsible for ensuring that age verification systems actually work, rather than placing blind faith in third-party technology. If Ofcom determines that Aylo has breached the law, the company could face a fine of up to £18 million or 10% of its global revenue. Aylo says it will cooperate with the investigation and maintains that Apple’s system is among the strongest available protections against underage access.
It’s notable that despite these suspicions surrounding youth access to pornography, Pornhub claims its user traffic dropped by three-quarters after the requirements for stronger age-verification systems were mandated and before Pornhub cutt off access to any new users. This development is worth analyzing. Have the societal discourses surrounding porn in the UK begun to turn people off it? Or are sexual subjects simply hesitant to provide personal details (such as credit cards and IDs) when accessing porn?
