As Utah’s porn law kicks in, adult site blocks access in the state
OSTILL/Getty Images
Legislation requiring adult websites to verify users’ ages every time they visit took effect this week, an effort that advocacy groups said is flawed and ambiguous.
After a law requiring websites that host adult content to verify users’ ages went into effect this week in Utah, a major adult site blocked access to the state’s residents, and advocacy groups raised questions about the bill’s identification requirements.
Pornhub and the sites owned by its parent company MindGeek now display a message that says the company has "made the difficult decision to completely disable access to our website in Utah" as well as a video message from adult performer Cherie DeVille asking users to tell elected officials to change the state’s age verification law.
That law, which passed in March and went into effect May 3, mandates that websites that contain adult content must verify users’ age every time they visit. Companies that are not in compliance would be liable for legal action if they are sued because they let a minor access their content.
Users’ ages could be verified through several methods, per the bill’s text, including a “digitized information card,” through a third-party age-verification service or from “any commercially reasonable method that relies on public or private transactional data to verify the age of the person attempting to access the material.”
Critics said those provisions are too vague and give ambiguous guidance. In an open letter to the bill’s sponsor, Utah State Sen. Todd Weiler, Alison Boden, the executive director of the adult entertainment industry’s trade group Free Speech Coalition, said she is “stumped” by the legislation.
Boden’s letter noted that Utah does not currently have a digital identification card, and she said she is unsure how to determine if a third-party database is "regularly used by government agencies and businesses for the purpose of age verification." Boden also said that relying on public or private transactional data “seems to imply that age verification providers must contract with data brokers—an option with significant privacy issues for Utahns.”
In response, Weiler tweeted the relevant section of the bill and asked if it sounds vague “to anyone else?” In a reply to another Twitter user, he also accused Pornhub of “not acting in good faith,” as it already complies with similar legislation in Louisiana. Unlike Utah, Louisiana does have a digital ID card available to state residents that can verify users’ ages before they visit adult sites.
Another consequence of Utah’s age verification law going into effect has been a surge in online searches for virtual private networks, which replace a user’s IP address with the address of the VPN server, allowing users to mask their physical locations. According to Google Trends data analyzed by market research firm CCI, Utah's search interest in VPNs has “exploded” since Pornhub blocked the site from Utah-based residents.
Mike Stabile, the Free Speech Coalition’s director of public affairs, said in a previous interview that ultimately these pieces of legislation in Louisiana and Utah will be subject to costly legal challenges and may be struck down.
He also argued lawmakers are more concerned with the “great optics” associated with these laws. He said legislators would rather pass these short-term bills and push for a ban on adult content in the long-term than look at serious solutions that could prevent minors accessing adult content.
A device-level content filter, for example, can be installed on a minor’s phone. In “literally a swipe and a half,” Stabile said, “I put in a code [and] that phone is blocked in terms of accessing adult content, adult sites.”
Stabile also urged lawmakers to engage more with the adult entertainment industry to help block minors from viewing inappropriate content. By working together, he said, a better outcome can be achieved.
“If you want to stop kids from accessing adult content, we're happy to help, we know how to do it,” he said. “The people in our industry are not aliens. We're parents, we have families, we know that adult content is for adults, we don't have any interest in having kids on our site. There's no upside to us on that. There's no business upside, and certainly from an ethical perspective, we don't want them there.”