Papers please: for millions of Americans, accessing online pornography now requires a government ID. It could have global implications for the future of the web.
How the American war on porn could change the way you use the internet
looks slightly annoyed
I’m not particularly enthusiastic about such state laws, but the UK spent the last several years having committed to mandate age verification itself prior to eventually abandoning it, and I didn’t see Voice of America trying to get people in the US riled up about British law.
With the passing of the Digital Economy Act 2017, the United Kingdom became the first country to pass a law containing a legal mandate on the provision of an Internet age verification system.
And if I recall, they had some follow-up effort, which I assume is what is briefly referenced in the article.
Implementing the Online Safety Act: Protecting children from online pornography
This is the second of four major consultations that Ofcom, as the appointed online safety regulator, will publish as part of our work to establish the new regulations under the Online Safety Act (2023).
Currently, services publishing pornographic content online do not have sufficient measures in place to prevent children from accessing this content. Many grant children access to pornographic content without age checks, or by relying on checks that only require the user to confirm that they are over the age of 18.
The Online Safety Act is clear that service providers publishing pornographic content online must implement age assurance which is highly effective at correctly determining whether or not a user is a child to prevent children from normally encountering their online pornographic content.
I didn’t see Voice of America trying to get people in the US riled up about British law.
Good. They’re not supposed to.
The purpose of the VoA is to broadcast American news and perspectives to the rest of the world. Their programming is not intended for Americans and for most of its history the VoA was prohibited by law from intentionally broadcasting directly to American citizens. A lot of Americans aren’t even aware the VoA exists because of this. This prohibition was eased somewhat in 2013 to make putting VoA content online easier and to allow Americans access to VoA content if we want it. ie I as an American citizen am allowed to hear what the VoA says but they’re still not supposed to talk to me on purpose.
If you do hear the Voice of America trying to get people in the US riled up about anything, be sure to let us know so that we can make the responsible individuals be in trouble.
looks slightly annoyed
I’m not particularly enthusiastic about such state laws, but the UK spent the last several years having committed to mandate age verification itself prior to eventually abandoning it, and I didn’t see Voice of America trying to get people in the US riled up about British law.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proposed_UK_Internet_age_verification_system
And if I recall, they had some follow-up effort, which I assume is what is briefly referenced in the article.
looks
Yeah.
https://www.ofcom.org.uk/online-safety/protecting-children/guidance-service-providers-pornographic-content/
Good. They’re not supposed to.
The purpose of the VoA is to broadcast American news and perspectives to the rest of the world. Their programming is not intended for Americans and for most of its history the VoA was prohibited by law from intentionally broadcasting directly to American citizens. A lot of Americans aren’t even aware the VoA exists because of this. This prohibition was eased somewhat in 2013 to make putting VoA content online easier and to allow Americans access to VoA content if we want it. ie I as an American citizen am allowed to hear what the VoA says but they’re still not supposed to talk to me on purpose.
If you do hear the Voice of America trying to get people in the US riled up about anything, be sure to let us know so that we can make the responsible individuals be in trouble.
Let alone Spain has already implemented a system for this which is part of a bigger EU effort. https://www.politico.eu/article/spain-builds-porn-passport-to-stop-kids-watching-smut/
Sadly, I don’t think this is going away.