During the afternoon of Wednesday, June 4, French internet users will hit a wall if they try to visit three of the world's most popular websites. Access to YouPorn, RedTube, and Pornhub will be suspended by decision of the owner, Canadian online porn giant Aylo. Instead, users will see a message explaining the situation, as is already the case in several American states.
"We will use our platforms to address the French public directly tomorrow [this Wednesday, editor's note]," Aylo explained to 01net. The date of this suspension was not chosen at random. There's a deadline on June 6: Arcom, the communications regulator, will be able to formally issue formal notices to pornographic sites based in the European Union that are in conflict with the legislation on age verification of Internet users. The three sites in question are located in the EU.
"We have publicly supported user age verification for years, but we believe that any law to this effect must preserve the security and privacy of users," says Aylo. "The way many jurisdictions around the world have chosen to implement age verification is ineffective, haphazard, and dangerous."
The company believes that the large-scale collection of personal data by adult sites "puts user security at risk." Aylo recalls American precedents, where Internet users use other methods to access this content.
"In Louisiana, Pornhub was one of the few sites to comply with the new law. Since then, our traffic in Louisiana has dropped by about 80%. These people haven't stopped looking for pornographic content. They've simply migrated to darker corners of the internet that don't ask users to verify their age, that don't respect the law, that don't take user safety seriously, and that often don't even moderate the content."
The one and only solution, according to the group, is to perform age verification "at the source," in other words: on the device, computer, smartphone, or tablet, used to connect to this type of site. This is a similar argument to what Aylo has been making for months. In fact, these publishers and several large tech companies like Meta are demanding that Apple and Google do the job. They may end up taking on this responsibility...
Aylo says it is ready to participate in the debate: "[we] are happy to collaborate with the government, civil society and technological partners to arrive at an effective device-based age verification solution." But everyone still needs to be brought together around the table. A possible solution is in any case being prepared at the European level, with an age verification app that will be implemented next July.
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