It’s not often your boss asks if you could check out a few porn websites at work.
Today, though, there’s a very good reason for doing so – one of the biggest changes to the way people access porn has come into effect.
Two decades ago, smut was usually found in a magazine on the top shelf at your local supermarket or in the dimly lit section of a video rental shop.
That landscape is almost unrecognisable today. Pornography, from ‘single ladies in your area’ to violent imagery, can be accessed with just a few clicks.
But from today, millions of adults trying to access pornography in the UK will be required to prove that they are over the age of 18 under the sweeping Online Safety Bill.
So we thought we would see how it’s going – how many porn sites have introduced checks, and how effective are they?
What is the age verification law in the UK?
Under the act, pornography companies, social media platforms and other services will be required to introduce age-verification measures to prevent children from accessing certain content.
Guidelines by the media regulator Ofcom say age-checks must be ‘technically accurate, robust, reliable and fair’.
How will age checks on adult content be enforced?
Self-reporting checkboxes that allow anyone to claim they’re 18 or over on porn websites will be replaced by document checks, age-estimating face scans, credit card validations and more, said Pavel Goldman Kalaydin, head of AI/ML at global verification and anti-fraud leader at Sumsub.
‘Superficial, easily bypassed forms of age gating are no longer acceptable,’ he told Metro. ‘Everything will hinge on whether the systems put in place now meet the definition of “robust” set out in the legislation.’
Kalaydin said XXX websites can meet this by doing multi-step processes, such as combining document inspections with artificial intelligence (AI).
‘An AI-powered neural network scans a face and creates a 3D map to analyse movement, facial features, lighting, and other key signs of reality,’ he added. ‘This same process can be used to estimate age, by looking at specific features and tell-tale signs of age, like “crows feet” for example. While accuracy is improving, though, it isn’t 100%.’
If adult websites don’t comply with theOnline Safety Act, they can be fined up to 10% of their worldwide revenue by Ofcom. Sites based outside the UK also need to implement age checks.
While adult content sites will be expected to do this, social media sites such as X and Reddit have also agreed to introduce verification.
Are adult websites complying with the rule?
The most visited pornographic services in the UK, like PornHub, YouPorn and RedTube, confirmed to Ofcom they’ll be complying with the age checks last month.
When accessing them, a pop-up reads: ‘To continue, we are required to verify that you are 18 or older, in line with the UK Online Safety Act.’
PornHub directs users to a verification tool, AllpassTrust, where they can be sent a code via email or phone number to view pornography.
According to the site’s Age Verification Page, Ofcom lists email and mobile network age checks as ‘highly effective age assurance measures’.
Other pornographic websites Metro looked at now ask people to ‘pass AI age verification’.
On one site Metro tried, a tool accesses the user’s webcam to scan their face – but the image shown on the screen is blurred ‘for privacy protection’.
Yet some 18+ websites still only require users to create an account and, by doing so, ‘certify’ that they are 18 or over. Others had no such requirement at all, though they tended to websites akin to a catalogue, where porn clips can be accessed and the full version is available on a different site.
A few porn tubes are openly defying the age-check mandate, with XVideos having a link on its front page to a blog post: ‘The Scam of Age Verification.’
The post touches on concerns from critics, including sex workers, tech firms, free speech advocates and privacy groups, who fear that age-verification measures will undercut privacy and harm free expression.
The June post reads: ‘The government claims it’s needed to catch edge cases – but in reality, it’s about shifting responsibility away from parents and ISPs, and dumping it onto websites like ours.
‘This, despite the fact that a parent already had to take conscious steps to enable access to adult content for their household, and was prompted to set up parental controls on every device they purchased.’
Bellesa, a self-described feminist porn site, can no longer be accessed from the UK. A notice says the law is ‘flawed and inadvertently hinders creators from legally sharing their adult content and freedom of artistic expression’.
Will age checks help protect children?
One of the most shocking aspects of how pornography has changed over the years is how it has affected children.
The NSPCC told Metro that between April last year and March this year, there were 788 Childline calls where the young person mentioned pornography. They included children who were just 10 years old.
One 15-year-old said: ‘I know I’ve got an addiction to adult content. It’s all I can think about. I tried to go fully offline for a week recently to stop and I couldn’t even do that.’
What does the NSPCC think of the new move?
Speaking to Metro, Rani Govender of the NSPCC said the children’s charity is ‘pleased’ that enforcement was beginning on the law.
She said: I think we shouldn’t underestimate how far this technology has come in terms of its accuracy and in terms of its ability to quickly identify children compared to adults, and to do this in a safe and privacy-preserving way.’
However, Rani added there were still some questions over whether the measure will mean people – including children – will be pushed towards less mainstream sources.
She said: ‘Something that we’ve been concerned about as the implementation goes on is that as the mainstream and more public sites become safer, harms will migrate further into smaller sites or into private messaging spaces.
‘If children aren’t accessing harmful material in the public spaces, it will become increasingly circulated in the private ones.’
David Wright, the director of the UK Safer Internet Centre, told Metro that the bill brings ‘much-needed accountability’.
‘While the scale and complexity of online harms continue to evolve, regulation must always keep pace,’ he said.
Many of the porn websites Metro looked at used Yoti, a company that develops digital ID cards and facial age estimation software.
Julia Dawson, Yoti’s chief policy and regulatory officer, said the act could help ‘solve one of the internet’s biggest challenges: how to keep young people safe from harmful content without sacrificing privacy’.
She added: ‘The costs of inaction could be painful – time to protect users and your business before Ofcom comes knocking.’
But age-check tools aren’t foolproof, with Kalaydin warning that deepfake technology is being increasingly used to create phoney documents which can bypass verification.
While Ryan T Williams, an online safety expert and father of one, told Metro that regulators need to be wary of virtual private networks (VPNs). These services dig a digital tunnel that shields browsing information from internet service providers.
‘VPN sites and sales will also need policing to make this effective,’ he said. ‘There needs to also be a bigger push on social media sites banning profiles and content, as adult content is easily shared on platforms, such as X, where ID would not be required.’
XVideos has been contacted for comment.
Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.
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