The battle has been long… and it is still far from being won. Since July 15, in France, online pornographic content must no longer be accessible to minors. Therefore, adult sites have the obligation to verify the age of their users, with an effective system that respects anonymity, under penalty of blocking.
After several back and forths, the big players in the sector withdrew. Pornhub, Youporn and Redtube, all owned by the Aylo group, have simply suspended access to their sites from France, denouncing the ineffectiveness of the filtering methods and their danger in terms of confidentiality.
83% of illegal sites
The others, constrained and obliged by Arcom, have implemented user age control through different platforms. Various authentication methods are offered such as selfie, ID or credit card number… At least, in theory.
According to a survey by France Info, of the top 108 free x sites, only 17% ask for proof of age. Therefore, more than 80% are in an irregular situation. In most cases, it is enough to click “yes” to the question “are you an adult?” Nothing very dissuasive, therefore.
As a result, many Internet users have simply changed their habits and turn to alternative sites that are less known than the giants of the sector… and above all, prohibited.
Worse still, if systems are indeed in place, they are very easy to circumvent. “We can find advice online with a few clicks, on any search engine,” Olivier Blazy, professor at the Polytechnic and specialist in digital identities, tells France Info.
For example, it is easy to find counterfeit ID cards with movie characters or stars on them. If the deception is obvious, the age verification system sees nothing but fire. However, the technique is punishable by up to three years in prison and a fine of 45,000 euros.
VPN at the party
And the VPN industry is benefiting greatly from this chaos. These can be used to bypass Internet restrictions placed in one country, making it appear that you are connecting to the Internet from another country.
“It’s a real hole in the business,” Jacky Lamraoui, director of the French start-up IdxLab, which offers an age verification solution to around twenty X sites, lamented to AFP in January. A VPN company tells France Info that its sales have skyrocketed 1,000% since the law was implemented.
A fashion that has not gone unnoticed by Free. The operator launched its free VPN service for its mobile subscribers in September. in an exchange
“Yes,” he simply responded to an Internet user who wanted to know if he could return to the “petanque” sites, a clever way of talking about pornographic sites. In fact, pétanque is played with pétanque and pornographic films may be called “ball films” rather than “sex films.”
The operator, for its part, specified that “it does not comment on the publications” of its general director. “The latter is in no way intended to provide minors with access to the pornographic site,” says Free.
Similar situation in the United Kingdom
Since then, PS MP Thierry Sother has taken a step forward by taking over Arcom, the digital policeman. “The free VPN that Free offers to its subscribers allows minors to bypass age restrictions online. A danger to their safety and health,” he says in Bluesky. The authority confirmed that it is following the matter “carefully”, while recalling that the use of VPN continues to be a minority among children under 13 years of age.
France is far from being an isolated case. Last July, our British neighbors drafted the Online Safety Act, a text that imposes age verification devices when entering sites that offer adult content.
But once again, obligations are easily evaded. Instead of providing their personal data, most Britons have also preferred to trust alternative sites, less known, but not subject to the restrictions imposed by the Online Safety Act. As a result, visits to porn sites in the UK have fallen by almost a third since the law was introduced. A figure that rises to 80% for the leader Pornhub.
Source: BFM TV
