UK to mandate age verification for porn

The UK government plans to become the first country in the world to introduce mandatory age verification for pornographic websites.

The new legislation, which comes into effect in mid-July, instructs porn websites to require their UK users to provide documented evidence of their age before accessing any pornographic material, or face sanctions and penalties.

Under the new regime, adult websites are intended to redirect UK visitors to a landing page free of pornographic material before they can complete this verification procedure.

The UK government has left the design and operation of the verification systems to the private sector, with four different companies having developed or proposed existing age verification systems.

The procedure will require users to provide documentation such as credit card details, passports, driver’s licences or proof of age cards.

One system offers alternative face scanning technology to estimate a user’s age, while another plans to sell “porn passes” in local shops where the age verification is completed at point of sale.

To attempt to address the major privacy and security implementations of such a regime, accredited age verification providers will need to comply with the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation standards and can undergo a voluntary certification scheme that will assess the data security standards of age verification providers.

Compliance with the new laws will be enforced by the British Board of Film Classification. The government has been quiet about how it intends to ensure compliance considering the wide proliferation of adult websites or how it plans to deal with users circumventing the age checks through the use of VPNs.

But while the new legal regime has undergone heavy criticism due to the technical and privacy implications, the UK’s Minister For Digital Margot James said research shows that 88% of UK parents with children aged 7–17 agree that there should be robust age verification controls for access to pornography online.

“Adult content is currently far too easy for children to access online,” she said.

“The introduction of mandatory age verification is a world first, and we’ve taken the time to balance privacy concerns with the need to protect children from inappropriate content. We want the UK to be the safest place in the world to be online, and these new laws will help us achieve this.”

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