The UK not too long ago began imposing the On-line Security Act’s age-check guidelines, and The Washington Put up studies that it’s already having a big impact on internet site visitors.
U.Ok. legislation now requires pornography web sites to confirm their customers’ ages via means equivalent to face scans and driver’s licenses; it additionally requires that on-line platforms forestall kids from being uncovered to grownup content material (which is why websites like Bluesky and Reddit have begun checking some customers’ ages).
To check the legislation’s impact, the Put up says it examined the highest 90 porn websites based mostly on U.Ok. customer information from Similarweb, discovering 14 websites that also don’t carry out an age examine. All 14 of them seem to have skilled a dramatic improve in site visitors, with certainly one of them seeing site visitors double year-over-year.
In the meantime, many web sites ostensibly complied with the legislation whereas criticizing it, linking to a petition urging repeal, and even supplied directions for getting round it.
John Scott-Railton, a researcher on the College of Toronto’s Citizen Lab, informed the Put up that that is “a textbook illustration of the legislation of unintended penalties,” including that the legislation “suppresses site visitors to compliant platforms whereas driving customers to websites with out age verification.”
