Ofcom, the regulatory body overseeing the Internet in the United Kingdom, has released preliminary guidelines outlining the measures that adult content websites must adopt to comply with recently enacted stringent legal mandates aimed at preventing children from accessing explicit material.
The new age-check guidance are set to be protectt children from accessing online pornography.
Latest research[1] shows that the average age at which children first see online pornography is 13 – although nearly a quarter come across it by age 11 (27%), and one in ten as young as 9 (10%). Additionally, nearly 8 in 10 youngsters (79%) have encountered violent pornography depicting coercive, degrading or pain-inducing sex acts before turning 18.
Under the Online Safety Act, sites and apps that display or publish pornographic content[2] must ensure that children are not normally able to encounter pornography on their service.
To do this, they must introduce ‘age assurance’ – through age verification, age estimation or a combination of both – which is ‘highly effective’ at correctly determining whether a user is a child or not. Effective access controls should prevent children from encountering pornographic content on that service.
Ofcom’s job is to produce guidance to help online pornography services to meet their legal responsibilities, and to hold them to account if they don’t.
“Our draft guidance sets strict criteria which age checks must meet to be considered highly effective; they should be technically accurate, robust, reliable and fair,” said the U.K’s internet regulator.
“We also expect services to consider the interests of all users when implementing age assurance. That means affording strong protection to children, and taking care that privacy rights are safeguarded and adults can still access legal pornography.
“Given the technology underpinning age assurance is likely to develop and improve in future, our guidance includes a non-exhaustive list of methods that we currently consider could be highly effective.”
These include:
- Open banking. A user can consent to their bank sharing information confirming they are over 18 with the online pornography service. Their full date of birth is not shared.
- Photo identification matching. Users can upload a photo-ID document, such as a driving licence or passport, which is then compared to an image of the user at the point of uploading to verify that they are the same person.
- Facial age estimation. The features of a user’s face are analysed to estimate their age[3].
- Mobile network operator age checks. Some UK mobile providers automatically apply a default content restriction which prevents children from accessing age-restricted websites. Users can remove this restriction by proving to their mobile provider that they are an adult, and this confirmation is then shared with the online pornography service.
- Credit cards checks. In the UK, credit card issuers are obliged to verify that applicants are over 18 before providing them with a credit card. A user can provide their credit card details to the online pornography service, after which a payment processor sends a request to check the card is valid to the issuing bank. Approval by the bank can be taken as evidence that the user is over 18.
- Digital identity wallets. Using a variety of methods, including those listed above users can securely store their age in a digital format, which the user can then share with the online pornography service.
In addition, Ofcom specify that pornographic content must not be visible to users before, or during, the process of completing an age check. Nor should services host or permit content that directs or encourages children to attempt to circumvent age and access controls.
“Pornography is too readily accessible to children online, and the new online safety laws are clear that must change.
“Our practical guidance sets out a range of methods for highly effective age checks. We’re clear that weaker methods – such as allowing users to self-declare their age – won’t meet this standard.
“Regardless of their approach, we expect all services to offer robust protection to children from stumbling across pornography, and also to take care that privacy rights and freedoms for adults to access legal content are safeguarded.” Dame Melanie Dawes, Ofcom’s Chief Executive
Ofcom added that it expect to publish its final guidance in early 2025, after which the Government will bring these duties into force.
