The UK’s porn regulator has admitted that under-18’s will be able to get around the government’s forthcoming age-verification measures.
The British Board of Film Classification (BBFC), which has been tasked with policing pornography websites, acknowledged that virtual private networks (VPNs) will allow users to evade the checks.
VPNs work by routing the web user’s connection through a foreign server, making it seem as if they are accessing the site from another country.
Age-verification is not a silver bullet, the BBFC said in a statement on its website .
Some determined teenagers will find ways to access pornography. However, children will no longer stumble across pornography on commercial pornographic websites.
Research carried out on behalf of the NSPCC and Office of the Children’s Commissioner (OCC) shows children are as likely to stumble across online pornography as to search for it.
Porn sites will carry age checks for UK users from July – here’s what you need to know
Although most VPNs require payment, MindGeek, the company behind some of the world’s largest porn sites such as PornHub and YouPorn, offers its own free VPN service, called VPNHub.
In the app’s description on Apple’s App Store, VPNHub boasts it will mask your true location by routing your data through our full stack of global encrypted servers.
The app is currently available on the Google Play and Apple app stores without an age rating.
However, MindGeek claims it will not be available in UK app stores without age verification once the ban comes into effect.
The ability for underage web users to access porn sites using a VPN is not the only loophole in the government’s age-verification plan.
With five million porn sites worldwide, the BBFC admits it will have to concentrate enforcement on the most popular sites that refuse to comply with the law.
UK porn block will begin on July 15 – and Brits will be forced to hand over ID
We will primarily investigate sites with high volumes of traffic, but also carry out spot checks on less visited sites, the BBFC states.
Additionally, we’ll consider investigating sites that are reported to us by charities, stakeholders and individuals.
This means that smaller porn sites that fly below the watchdog’s radar could still be accessible to younger users.
Moreover, social media and search engines are not defined as “online commercial pornography” and so will not be required to carry age checks.
The government’s age-verification checks will UK porn block will begin on July 15 – and Brits will be forced to hand over ID .
Anyone attempting to access a porn site from a UK IP address will have to prove their age before they are able to view explicit content.
Age-verification solutions range from the use of traditional ID documents online (for example, credit cards or passports) to mobile phones where the adult filters have been removed.