Pornhub is protesting this law and others by blocking the site.

Pornhub blocked all users in Arkansas after the state’s new age verification law went into effect on Tuesday. The law requires porn sites to verify that users are at least 18 years old. Pornhub argued that requiring ID verification actually harms users’ privacy and puts children at risk. MindGeek, Pornhub’s operator, has decided to block access from states with similar age verification laws. After complying with a similar law in Louisiana, Pornhub traffic dropped by 80%, so they decided blocking access entirely was preferable to implementing age verification.

States they have blocked for similar laws: Virginia, Utah, Mississippi.

In Louisiana the first state to do this they tried to comply and their traffic decreased by 80%.

  • Nepenthe
    0•1 year ago

    So…not that I will ever be for such an idea, but how is requiring ID putting kids at risk. I thought that was a misquote, but no, that’s what the article itself says. Are we really just saying whatever random words come to mind these days?

    • bane_killgrind
      6•1 year ago

      Probably kids will increase risk to themselves by using less secure sites, using chat platforms to source pornography, or uploading their real ID to people providing photoshopping services.

    • Maestro
      6•1 year ago

      Their personal data will need to be stored somewhere for this to work, and it will leak. Eventually. Security always fails. And with these government age ID systems built by the lowest bidder it will fail sooner rather than later.

    • 👁️👄👁️English
      5•1 year ago

      It’s puts everyone at risk. How do you expect that to be securely checked? Not only is it basically privacy invasive to the maximum, but you’re giving your government ID to multiple different sites who now have the job of securing your ID. With how many hacks go on nowadays, your ID is the last thing you want to get leaked. It’s not much different from getting your SSN hacked.

      • bane_killgrind
        4•1 year ago

        Government run Oauth is the only real way to implement this, with zero PII being provided to the porn sites. All they get is an anonymised token when you log in.
        Then again, the government Oauth service needs to be hardened in that case, but presumably government web stuff has government level security practices.