Ofcom will investigate whether the age assurance system adopted by Pornhub parent company Aylo for its return to operation in the UK complies with the UK’s Online Safety Act. In particular, the regulator will look into whether the operating system-level checks the pornography distributor is using meets the requirement to implement “highly effective age assurance.”
The online pornography network ceased signing up new users in the UK in February, claiming that the Online Safety Act does not work as intended and arguing for age checks to be performed at the device level, if at all. Aylo turned to Apple’s age check signals to re-enter the market in May.
At the time, the Age Verification Provider’s Association (AVPA) released a statement arguing that the Apple solution for UK Pornhub users “does not clearly achieve compliance.” That’s because device-level checks do not confirm that the user of the device is the individual whose age has been confirmed. Any child who knows a parent or older sibling’s PIN could be using their device, for example.
Ofcom says Aylo “may not have conducted sufficient due diligence and testing before implementing its new age assurance process.”
The formal investigation will consider whether Aylo is using highly effective age assurance and if it completed a sufficient children’s access assessment.
Ofcom also says, however, that its investigation “will not make a determination” on Apple’s age verification system.
Enforcement undercuts non-compliant competition argument
Aylo’s argument against the OSA’s effectiveness at the beginning of the year was based on a combination of misrepresented data privacy risks and the continuing operation of non-compliant sites in the UK. Since then, Ofcom has stepped up enforcement as promised, and said in August that all of the UK’s top ten porn sites and the majority of the top hundred are compliant.
The regulator can impose fines of up to 18 million pounds (roughly US$24 million) or 10 percent of qualifying worldwide revenue.
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Article Topics
Aylo | device-based age verification | Ofcom | Online Safety Act | OS-level age verification | UK age verification
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