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Porn block: UK to require age checks for adult content as of July 15
Porn sites serving UK users will soon be required to confirm the age of visitors before letting them access content, the British government said Wednesday. As of July 15, commercial providers of pornography will have to ensure that only those over the age of 18 are able to access adult content, to protect minors.
It'll be up to individual sites and services to choose how they carry out verification. Options include face-to-face verification in stores, which would let people buy a so-called "porn pass," or the use of a service like Mindgeek's AgeID system, which lets people upload scans of their passports or driving licenses to be verified by a third party.
Age checks were originally supposed to come into effect this spring as part of the Digital Economy Act 2017, but they were delayed while the government worked out the details of the new rules. The British Board of Film Classification will be in charge of ensuring that porn sites comply with the law. Those that fail to do so could be blocked.
"Adult content is currently far too easy for children to access online," Margot James, UK minister for digital, said in a statement. "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."
Opponents of the new rules pointed out that they won't cover smaller sites or social networks, and can be circumvented by the use of VPNs. Others fear the systems used to verify age will be open to exploitation, and could result in people's privacy being violated and their browsing histories being circulated beyond their control.
"Having some age verification that is good and other systems that are bad is unfair and a scammer's paradise -- of the government's own making," Jim Killock, executive director of Open Rights Group, said in a statement. "Data leaks could be disastrous. And they will be the government's own fault. The government needs to shape up and legislate for privacy before their own policy results in people being outed, careers destroyed or suicides being provoked."
Also at ZDNet
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 18 2019, @06:57PM (5 children)
"Adult content is currently far too easy for children to access online"
Every adult human is a someone's child.
I hope they figured out age-verification with sufficient privacy and anonymity done correctly too.
(Score: 3, Funny) by takyon on Thursday April 18 2019, @07:00PM
I hope nobody hacks the verification system and sexposes everybody who was dumb enough to use it.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Thursday April 18 2019, @08:19PM (3 children)
And while we're at it I want a pony /s
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 0, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 18 2019, @10:32PM
A pony? You dirty, dirty boy tangomargarine
(Score: 2) by driverless on Friday April 19 2019, @12:19AM
Wouldn't you rather have a sheep instead? The wool gives you something to grip onto.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 19 2019, @02:50AM
I've gone and put a pony on Liverpool. Did you see that ludicrous display last night? What was Wenger thinking sending Walcott on that early? You see the thing about arsenal is they always try and walk it in.