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posted by chromas on Sunday July 12 2020, @05:55PM   Printer-friendly
from the ♪I-know-a-bay-where-they-don't-ask-for-ID♪
♪Yo-ho,-yo-ho,-a-pirate's-life-for-me♪
dept.

The French Parliament unanimously agreed on Thursday to introduce a nationwide age verification system for pornography websites, months after President Emmanuel Macron pledged to protect children against such content.

Macron made the protection of children against adult content online a high-profile issue well before the coronavirus crisis hit. In January, tech companies, internet services providers and the adult movies industry signed a voluntary charter, pledging to roll out tools to help ensure minors don't have access to pornographic content.

Within a broader law on domestic violence, the Senate decided in June to introduce an amendment requiring pornography websites to implement an age verification mechanism.

In order to enforce the law, the French audiovisual regulator CSA will be granted new powers to audit and sanction companies that do not comply — sanctions could go as far as blocking access to the websites in France with a court order.

The choice of verification mechanisms will be left up to the platforms. But lawmakers have suggested using credit card verification — a system first adopted by the U.K., which mulled similar plans to control access to pornography but had to drop them in late 2019 because of technical difficulties and privacy concerns. Italy also approved a similar bill in late June, which raised the same concerns over its feasibility and compliance with the EU laws.

[...] The Senate has already voted on the bill. Following an agreement today between senators and lawmakers from the lower house National Assembly, a final vote will be held again in the Senate where the bill is expected to pass.


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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 12 2020, @07:22PM (20 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 12 2020, @07:22PM (#1019976)

    Did anyone ask the children if they wanted to be protected against such content?

    I'm an old coot, but I remember that my goal as an 11 year old boy was to find and consume as much "adult content" as I could possibly locate. Which back then meant buying individual pages of Playboy (not the articles) for 25 cents a page from an aspiring entrepreneur in our junior high school. (Centerfolds were a dollar.) Sadly our supplier was busted when his father found out what his son was cutting out of the father's "collection".

    I could go on with anecdotes, but the point is that whatever obstacles those ancient Gallic fuddy-duddies put in their way, I am certain the youth of France will find a way to access all the "adult content" they want.

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  • (Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Sunday July 12 2020, @07:51PM (8 children)

    by Grishnakh (2831) on Sunday July 12 2020, @07:51PM (#1019987)

    Did anyone ask the children if they wanted to be protected against such content?

    Children have no voice in a democratic society; no one cares what they think. It's up to voters, who are their parents and people of similar or older ages. And apparently French adults don't want children seeing any porn (which is weird to me; I thought continental Europe was supposed to be a little less Puritan about sex than America).

    I am certain the youth of France will find a way to access all the "adult content" they want.

    Most parents and older people are too clueless to know what a VPN is.

    • (Score: 2) by Opportunist on Sunday July 12 2020, @08:10PM

      by Opportunist (5545) on Sunday July 12 2020, @08:10PM (#1019997)

      Well, sure as hell the geriatrics in the parliaments around the globe don't know what a VPN is.

      And could we please leave it at that? As long as they think they're in charge, and we pretend that they are, they are mostly a minor nuisance but not really a problem.

    • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday July 12 2020, @09:22PM (4 children)

      by JoeMerchant (3937) on Sunday July 12 2020, @09:22PM (#1020023)

      But, have you seen "made in France for the French market fetish porn"? That's what they're trying to protect the children from, most of them don't understand what makes their own countrymen and women do some of the things they appear to enjoy...

      --
      🌻🌻 [google.com]
      • (Score: 2) by Opportunist on Sunday July 12 2020, @10:28PM (3 children)

        by Opportunist (5545) on Sunday July 12 2020, @10:28PM (#1020047)

        To be honest, I don't know any French porn. Then again, I highly doubt that dialogue is the key element, I mean, has anyone watched Baywatch with sound as a kid? But if they're like the rest of their movies, I can only agree that the world should be kept safe from them.

        • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday July 12 2020, @10:32PM

          by JoeMerchant (3937) on Sunday July 12 2020, @10:32PM (#1020051)

          Baywatch is very popular in Europe, particularly Germany... for the obvious reasons.

          I was kidding about the French porn, but as you say, the rest of their cultural output makes Woody Allen look positively normal...

          --
          🌻🌻 [google.com]
        • (Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Monday July 13 2020, @07:10PM

          by bzipitidoo (4388) on Monday July 13 2020, @07:10PM (#1020582) Journal

          There is one historic figure from France who was infamous for his sick sexual life: the Marquis de Sade.

          You've made it big when languages get a new word based on your name, with the definition of course based on the most notorious thing for which you were known.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 15 2020, @05:41AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 15 2020, @05:41AM (#1021741)

          You don't know Brigette Lahai? Being a pornstar in france doesn't carry as much stigma as it does in most countries - half the french population has done porn if I had to guess.

    • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 12 2020, @09:40PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 12 2020, @09:40PM (#1020031)

      which is weird to me; I thought continental Europe was supposed to be a little less Puritan about sex than America

      Yes, seeing simple naked body parts. It's a different thing when it comes to your children watching shit or piss porn, or ethnic Arab kids picking up slut vocabulary from pornos and hurling it at respectable Frenchwomen on the street.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 13 2020, @07:41PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 13 2020, @07:41PM (#1020600)

      they're scared that if french youth watch modern porn all the french adults will have to take a dog trimmer to their waving pussy and dick manes!

  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Opportunist on Sunday July 12 2020, @08:08PM

    by Opportunist (5545) on Sunday July 12 2020, @08:08PM (#1019996)

    Get with the times, nobody asks the people who get "protected" whether they have any interest to be protected.

    What matters is how it makes you feel, not how it affects those you pretend to protect.

  • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday July 12 2020, @08:51PM

    by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Sunday July 12 2020, @08:51PM (#1020013) Journal

    ancient Gallic fuddy-duddies

    Did you mean Gallic, or did you mean phallic? Funny that those words sound so much alike . . .

  • (Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Sunday July 12 2020, @09:48PM (4 children)

    by PartTimeZombie (4827) on Sunday July 12 2020, @09:48PM (#1020036)

    ...I am certain the youth of France will find a way to access all the "adult content" they want.

    Of course they will. These stupid laws are not about stopping kids from seeing boobs, they're about "doing something".

    As in "something must be done".

    • (Score: 4, Touché) by Opportunist on Sunday July 12 2020, @10:30PM

      by Opportunist (5545) on Sunday July 12 2020, @10:30PM (#1020049)

      Damn straight, boobies are not for little kids!

    • (Score: 2) by VLM on Monday July 13 2020, @12:38PM (2 children)

      by VLM (445) Subscriber Badge on Monday July 13 2020, @12:38PM (#1020263)

      Doesn't France have beaches with boobs?

      I mean, the legacy population is being rapidly and intentionally replaced with burka wearers so maybe not anymore, but used to be able to see boobs in France?

      • (Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Monday July 13 2020, @08:57PM

        by PartTimeZombie (4827) on Monday July 13 2020, @08:57PM (#1020679)

        I'm not sure when you were last in France, but I can assure that is far from the case.

        Parts of Paris might have a large Muslim community, but that is quite a long way from any beaches.

        And yes, boobs are often on display in many parts of Europe.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 15 2020, @05:44AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 15 2020, @05:44AM (#1021742)

        You live in a fantasy world. French are one of the most racist people in Europe. If you are from literally any other European country the French will literally physically harass you once you are out of Paris. Ask anybody.

        Seriously, you have 0 knowledge of world outside of the USA.

  • (Score: 2) by Thexalon on Monday July 13 2020, @12:54AM

    by Thexalon (636) on Monday July 13 2020, @12:54AM (#1020108)

    They aren't really trying to protect children. They're really trying to protect parents from the thought that their precious child could be wanking in their bedroom right now.

    They also seem to think that if kids can't get access to porn, they won't be trying to get off somehow. And if it's not by wanking to porn, it will probably be experimenting more with their friends, forming intimate partnerships with someone, and/or just using their imaginations and wanking to that. Because that's what people do when they're post-puberty and horny.

    --
    The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 13 2020, @07:47AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 13 2020, @07:47AM (#1020178)

    I see things somewhat more maliciously here. This has nothing to do with kids. This is about power and surveillance. It will now give the French government substantial power to 'investigate' potentially offending companies as well as large amounts of potentially embarrassing information on their population. Knowing that e.g. Emanuel Macron chose to 'verify' his browsing at GayTrannyDwarves.com is something that could, at any time, be used against him in a variety of ways.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 13 2020, @07:54AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 13 2020, @07:54AM (#1020181)

    It has to be "bad". That's how the game is played. That's why a few pages of adult content on the jr. high black market cost as much as the whole magazine when I was that age. The book store had all that stuff in a hard to reach place, with a picture of the Emperor from Star Wars with the lightning bolts coming out of his fingers warning any would-be "young skywalkers" not to trifle with such things. Careless dads were probably an easier source.

    A little later on, when I started driving, I found one of my dad's mags.

    I had just started driving, and was being conscientious so of course I checked the spare tire. That's where it was hidden--under the spar. So at dinner I brought up how I was being a very careful driver and taking good care of the car, and mentioned casually how I had even checked the pressure in the spare. The next day I checked it again and the mag was gone. I had no interest in sharing *that* with my dad. He didn't say a word about it. Mom had no clue. It was just a father and son, talking about cars.

    And that's how it's done...

  • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday July 13 2020, @02:16PM

    by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Monday July 13 2020, @02:16PM (#1020307) Journal

    You seem to be unaware, or want to ignore that one of the major goals of Western society is to protect children from ever finding out about sex. About how their bodies work. About where children come from. (The stork brings them.) About how pregnancy happens.

    Especially during adolescence, this is important. They should not understand what is happening to them.

    --
    People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.