UK Age Verification

Are what Pornhub and AgeID acceptable to the UK government?

So far all age verification methods require you passing on a copy of documents that could fall into the wrong hands. Will users like that? How can they verify the user isn't a kid using his Dad's passport?

Will it cover sites like Twitter and Facebook?

How does it cover people using a VPN or similar?

The articles I found were very vague on how they will enforce it.

The UK will block online porn from April. Here's what we know | WIRED UK

https://www.siliconrepublic.com/ente...t-child-safety

https://www.express.co.uk/life-style...al-Economy-Act

Of course, it could be a good thing for those with UK traffic. Asking surfers to pay for access is a good way to verify the user.

Yer it's hard to say at this stage I guess.

And you're right the articles are very loose.

Ill informed as usual Markham.

Check out https://www.avsecure.com/

Free to install and the webmaster to use - Free for the surfer to use, or for highest privacy level, surfer buys a card in newsagent or offlicence and newsagent verifies age at purchase - Then they use the number from that card and tha iDs them.

No personal data being uploaded at all.

Check out Age Checked ! Tell em FUBAR sent you !

https://agechecked.org/

I'm leaning towards https://www.avsecure.com/ mainly because it's free and I have a shit load of UK targeted sites, I'm already moving most of my sites to mojo to make it easier to transition when the time comes. Hopefully though, it's all a load of bollocks and will never work.

Being an affiliate there's no way I can afford to pay for each person to be age checked. I'd be bankrupt within a couple of days.

Also, I'll try and change the sites I can to show no nudity but I'm unsure yet as to what is aloud to be shown, so I'll just wait and see.

Same here w/ AV Secure. I had a phone call with their owner and they offer a good package for both webmasters and the end-user.

Still remains to be seen how this will all come into being. How UK will enforce it, will it be enforced right away (or at all...), etc.

wondering, as no one has mentioned this to me...

is live cam going to be banned too? Freeview, I can imagine being stated as porn, MFC maybe. However, if live cam is paid, the customer has already paid and shown ID, therefore, wouldn´t be banned, or shouldn´t be...

So answer the questions oh wise one.

Will plain nudity be regarded as porn?

Mindgeeks ageid will be free to UK sites apparently

Do you mean UK corps or what do you mean UK "sites" exactly and where is your source?

The OP asked if there were other providers - as other posters have already pointed out there are several so I wont bother to repeat them.

Whereas you proceeded to raise a bunch of irrelevant questions and posted a load of ill -informed tabloid nonsense which muddied the waters even further.

If anyone reading this wants the actual truth here is a link to the actual bill. ( you need section 3 which starts on page 17 ).

https://publications.parliament.uk/p...70045_en_3.htm

If you take the time to read it Markham, should you be able to muster adequate attention - there are no pretty pictures or your beloved graphs, you will find that you really need to comply or lose any traffic / revenue you generate in the UK.

Which of course is not relevant to you.

Is it Paul.

https://www.engadget.com/2018/03/03/...n-tool-for-uk/

One rule for big multi nationals I guess.

Will the UKgov block sites that don't comply?

Start with porn...and from there...

It doesn't offer any advice on what method porn sites should use to verify a persons age. So fuck you.

[QUOTE]Internet pornography: requirement to prevent access by persons under the
age of 18
(1)A person must not make pornographic material available on the internet on a
commercial basis to persons in the United Kingdom except in a way that
40secures that, at any given time, the material is not normally accessible by
persons under the age of 18.
Digital Economy BillPage 18

(2)For the purposes of this Part, making pornographic material available on the
internet on a commercial basis includes making it available on the internet free
of charge—
(a)on or via an internet site which is operated on a commercial basis, or
(b)5via any other means of accessing the internet which is operated or
provided on a commercial basis.
(3)The age-verification regulator (see section 17) must publish guidance about—
(a)types of arrangements for making pornographic material available that
the regulator will treat as complying with subsection (1);
(b)10circumstances in which the regulator will treat an internet site or other
means of accessing the internet as operated or provided on a
commercial basis; and
(c)other circumstances in which the regulator will treat making
pornographic material available on the internet as done on a
15commercial basis.
(4)Regulations 17 to 20 and 22 of the Electronic Commerce (EC Directive)
Regulations 2002 (S.I. 2002/2013S.I. 2002/2013) apply in relation to this Part, despite
regulation 3(2) of those Regulations.
(5)For the purposes of this Part—
(a)20making material available on the internet does not include making the
content of an on-demand programme service available on the internet
in the course of providing such a service;
(b)a means of accessing the internet does not include any device or other
equipment for doing so.
(6)25In subsection (5), “on-demand programme service” has the meaning given by
section 368A of the Communications Act 2003.[/QUOTE]

So my questions are still relevant.

Looks like the UK is behind their deadline to role this out and everything is unclear to everyone. They can't, and wont, go out and enforce something that they haven't set standards and means for yet. Total fuckfest

As soon as you provide access to any adult material, (Even just a tit), you have to be compliant with the UK legislation upcoming for end of April (We think it might get push back a little though) ...

In a nutshell :

As Site owner, Affiliate, Blogs, etc..

For any ancillary provider (Billing, Ad Network, etc..)

Ex: Biller : As long as they're not complying, you can't bill their UK traffic anymore... Ad Network, you can't expose their ads to UK surfers... BTW, Ad Networks, hit me up, we have $$ for you


That being said, Alastair (CEO) and Sanjeet from AgeChecked know everything about it, as I'm more on the Marketing and Events Management side for AgeChecked.com, but like most at this stage, I'm still reading and learning. The Regulator himself still have a few questions he can't answer clearly... Dating seams to be still in a grey zone ... Same for the Texts (Vanilla Photo with very Hardcore Text, they don't know yet...).

For those of you who will be in Phoenix, I invite you to book a meeting with us using this link here : https://agechecked.youcanbook.me/

A few alternatives to Mindgeek monopoly
https://agechecked.org
https://avsecure.com
https://avyourself.com
https://www.yoti.com

also a good reading
https://www.theverge.com/2018/2/23/1...n-law-mindgeek

So who's going to check the billion websites to see if they have a tit showing or displaying hardcore text?

Prediction: nothing happens.

Too complicated, unenforceable, drain on resources, unclear regulations, debatable regulations (courts), etc etc.

In the end: nothing, or perhaps some lame toothless "age check" (yes, you simply check a box that says "I'm over 18") to save face and that's it.

Carry on.

...and then, legit mainstream businesses that they will be bribed or pressured to take down by various monopolies, corpos etc. etc and ending on their political rivals.

The same old story as always.

They would have to ban Mills and Boon style books surely as well if that is the case!

It is beyond idiotic measure. It did not take much for the masses to find out about ways to stream Hollywood movies using Android boxes. Once word spreads you can install Tor browser just like Chrome and watch free porn again, thing is a massive waste of time.

I can understand parents not wanting their youngsters to see some of the stuff on these tubes. But, why does everyone else has to do the job they should be doing. It's easy fix, don't allow them a smartphone and monitor their computer use when doing homework. Besides that no internet! They will probably grow up much healthier without any of this social media sharing bullshit.

I completely agree.

These days, most young parents are dumb and their kids fucking spoiled.

https://www.xbiz.com/news/234173/u-k...on-regulations

interesting, thanks

More on the delay until later in the year: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technolo...porn-websites/

I think most people would verify their ID only once. Let's say a UK user goes to Pornhub and gets presented with MindGeek's solution and goes to the trouble of verifying his age, and the next time he goes to another site that uses some other company, he will most likely say "fuck it I'm not going through this again", and he will just go back to Pornhub (or any other site that uses MindGeek's solution).


MindGeek has so much traffic themselves and has a solution ready to put live on all their high traffic properties as soon as the requirements go in effect, so I think if you will use another solution the chance that the user already verified through MindGeek's solution and doesn't want to go through verification again and leaves your site is pretty big.

I think the other solutions only have a chance if they get some huge sites to use them and start verifying users before MG starts.


On the other hand, it is not even announced yet how the age verification should work exactly, sho who knows
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technolo...porn-websites/

Very true but it *could* work the other way.
For some (pay)site owners, it could be good to get rid of the freeloaders who have no intention of buying (those verified by Mindgeek).

I'd rather a smaller number of verified users who are willing to pay using a different AV system. If lots of paysites use the same system, even better as theres a chance for upsells from each other.

One thing everyone seems to miss is that dramatic effect this will have on all the "traffic" broking companies.

The quality of "traffic" from the majority of these places is frankly criminally poor.

When this law eventually makes it into the wild these companies will be held to account. The millions of hits they all claim to be able to deliver will suddenly disappear.

A bot cannot verify its age.

Hi New Nick. Seems I was right and you are a dumb arse.

I posted in Webmaster Q & Fuckin' A yesterday:

https://www.xbiz.com/news/234173/u-k...on-regulations

https://avn.com/business/articles/le...es-767398.html

What I was at TES Lisbon/Cascais last weekend, the impression was that there were too many loose ends.

Then this week, on the news, worry about Cyber-hacking of customer (age verification) data.

I think there are big worries in the UK population that their personal data - used for age verification - will be hacked.

The UK and EU have added Privacy rules, but I think most people don't trust the Internet itself as having the security necessary to keep personal data secure.

Until the British government figures that out, the people will say "no" to this.

If and when enacted, this would be a huge burden for webmasters around the world, despite a half-dozen sharp companies ready to be the middlemen.

Really Paul ?

What exactly were you right about ?

Here's another alternative press story:

https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2018/03/1...source=Twitter

.


https://www.engadget.com/2018/03/12/...-verification/

UK delays mandatory age verification on porn sites

It's now expected adult sites won't have to put up age gates until the end of the year.

Ever since the Digital Economy Act became UK law this time last year, we've known there would come a time when porn sites would be compelled to verify the age of British visitors to ensure they're only letting adults in. Not long after, the UK's digital minister set a deadline of April 2018, at which point porn sites would have to comply or face the consequences. We had assumed everything was on track, but the UK government has admitted we're nowhere near ready to police porn sites, and now it expects age verification won't be enforceable until the end of the year.

The UK's Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport announced over the weekend the recipients of a £25 million ($35ish million) pot earmarked for 5G projects. The fund will support trials of 5G-equipped drones geared for "smart farming," internet of things things in healthcare applications and autonomous vehicle tech, among other research. Curiously, the government slipped into this release an admission that we don't yet have clear guidelines drawn up for porn sites to follow, and so mandatory age verification will be delayed until these sites know what's expected of them.

The British Board of Film Classification (BBFC), which decides the age ratings for movies, games and music videos, recently took on the additional role of porn regulator. The BBFC will be able to fine sites that don't introduce age checks up to £250,000 (around $346,000) or up to 5 percent of their turnover. Additionally, it can order ISPs to block sites and even tell service providers, such as those that process payments or manage on-site advertising, to stop working with sites not adhering to the rules. Social networks will also have a responsibility to mute the voices of non-compliant peddlers.

We knew the BBFC was likely to take on this extra job as far back as 2016, but it was only officially appointed in the new regulatory role last month. That's the main reason for the delay: The BBFC is just now writing the guidelines porn sites and their service providers will have to follow. These will be published towards the end of this month in draft form, so the industry and anyone else with an opinion can comment on them. When it seems like a best-fit solution has been reached, the government then has to voice its approval before giving porn sites three months to get ready to implement age verification tools. This is all expected to come to a conclusion before the end of the year, but as with all things government, the process could very well drag on for longer.

A big part of what the BBFC has to figure out is what forms of age verification will be appropriate. "We expect to see a number of solutions offered by providers to give people different ways to verify their age," an FAQ on the BBFC website states. The owner of Pornhub and many other adult sites, Mindgeek, recently detailed the system it intends to use. AgeID is an encrypted login that can work across any site, meaning someone only has to verify their age once to get into any site that uses the same tool. Apparently it doesn't store any personal information, just the data it needs to tell a site: Yes, this visitor is over 18.

Mindgeek isn't just planning to use AgeID across its own brands. It intends to license the tool out to other sites and let smaller, independent providers use it for free. There is the question of whether one huge porn distributor should dictate how every UK-facing site checks age, but that's exactly the kind of thing the BBFC should be looking at. As you can imagine, a lot of people aren't happy about mandatory age verification in general. The worry is that any mechanism will leave a digital trail, meaning your personal porn habits are cataloged... somewhere -- one of the benefits of Mindgeek's AgeID tool is that it follows you around so you don't have to log in to every individual site. And if a record exists, how can we be sure this remains private and secure?

In that sense, the BBFC is likely glad to have more time to get its ducks in a row and the industry in agreement. Between now and whenever age verification eventually becomes mandatory, perhaps it will allay the public's fears by being transparent about how exactly age checking systems are going to work in practice.

Even though the 6 or so Age Verification sites were prepared to share results with each other, I never did hear how that was going to look to the surfer on his/her first visit to any of my sites.

This was the UK Age Verification panel at TES Lisbon Cascais last weekend. The fellow with the beard in the middle is Barry from the BBFC, the Regulator.

The other speakers represent the companies ready to do the age verification. The fellow with the shaved head on the right is from Mind Geek's Age Verification product. Mind Geek claims to control 50% of worldwide adult content and traffic.

The fellow next to him. on the far right, is Stephen Winyard, of AV Secure.

Mindgeek surely controls a lot but I doubt it's anything close to 50% at this moment.

Affiliates and webmaster. Do a deal with a VPN to mask the British surfers' location and make it look like they are living elsewhere.

Simple solution and one you can make a bit of money out of.

It's people like this who's been pushing for this because they see ££ signs, fuck all to do with protecting kids.

They all look dodgy fuckers.

I wonder if they're still smiling now there's a chance it's gonna to go tits up.

How would you propose to accomplish that? Sounds like something impossible in practice In theory I can see some possible ways... but that's just theoretical.
It's different kind of story on the server side and different on the user/client side.

A banner with a link that sells/sends the user to a VPN site. The site sends the surfer straight back to you after the deal is done on the VPN site.

Is that a magic link Paul ?

Alright then, it could work this way, but... how will a potential visitor see my site when it's blocked on the UK ISP's DNS?
If a person is already using VPN then he or she is not in need for another one...

Hmm.. I read on https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/0...ine_behaviour/ that :

50 sites blocked for £100k or more, wow... that sounds like an impossible job then to block all smaller sites, it would cost more to block a site, than actual earnings of a smaller site.

And I imagine that if somehow ISP was able to do it cheaper way and get to work a huge list of domains it would slow down user experience of the Internet as whole, as all the traffic queries would need to go through some kind of system, it will screw the latency of the UK Internet users, and for some people like for example gamers, latency is very important key factor. Sometimes it's a difference between win or loose in fast paced multiplayer games.. This is madness.

So if I get this right, you're publicly suggesting to webmasters to do something borderline illegal ?

There are several ways to comply legally, without running over or around the law.