Pornhub shuts down in Texas to protest age verification law


Pornhub has disabled its site in Texas in response to the state’s online age verification law. The site now displays a message to users in the state that says having to provide an ID when accessing an adult website “is not an effective solution for protecting users online.”
“As you may know, your elected officials in Texas are requiring us to verify your age before allowing you to access our website,” Pornhub says in a notice to users. “Not only does this impinge on the rights of adults to access protected speech, it fails strict scrutiny by employing the least effective and yet also the most restrictive means of accomplishing Texas’s stated purpose of allegedly protecting minors.”
Pornhub argues that on-device age verification is “the only effective solution for protecting minors and adults alike.” This method could involve using facial recognition or another method to verify a user’s age locally on their device.
“Unfortunately the Texas law for age verification is ineffective, haphazard, and dangerous,” Alex Kekesi, Aylo’s vice president of brand and community says in an emailed statement to The Verge. “Not only will it not actually protect children, it will inevitably reduce content creators’ ability to post and distribute legal adult content and directly impact their ability to share the artistic messages they want to convey with it.”
Pornhub may soon run into issues outside the US, too. The European Union’s Digital Services Act (DSA) designates Pornhub and other adult sites as “Very Large Online Platforms,” which could require them to implement age verification and take down illegal content. Pornhub sued the EU over its designation last month, according to a report from Politico.
Pornhub has disabled its site in Texas in response to the state’s online age verification law. The site now displays a message to users in the state that says having to provide an ID when accessing an adult website “is not an effective solution for protecting users online.” “As you…
Recent Posts
- The iOS 18.4 beta brings Matter robot vacuum support
- Philips Monitors is now offering a whopping 5-year warranty on some of its displays, including a gorgeous KVM-enabled business monitor
- The secretive X-37B space plane snapped this picture of Earth from orbit
- Beyond 100TB, here’s how Western Digital is betting on heat dot magnetic recording to reach the storage skies
- The end of an era? TSMC, Broadcom could tear apart Intel’s legendary business after 57 years by separating its foundry and chip design
Archives
- February 2025
- January 2025
- December 2024
- November 2024
- October 2024
- September 2024
- August 2024
- July 2024
- June 2024
- May 2024
- April 2024
- March 2024
- February 2024
- January 2024
- December 2023
- November 2023
- October 2023
- September 2023
- August 2023
- July 2023
- June 2023
- May 2023
- April 2023
- March 2023
- February 2023
- January 2023
- December 2022
- November 2022
- October 2022
- September 2022
- August 2022
- July 2022
- June 2022
- May 2022
- April 2022
- March 2022
- February 2022
- January 2022
- December 2021
- November 2021
- October 2021
- September 2021
- August 2021
- July 2021
- June 2021
- May 2021
- April 2021
- March 2021
- February 2021
- January 2021
- December 2020
- November 2020
- October 2020
- September 2020
- August 2020
- July 2020
- June 2020
- May 2020
- April 2020
- March 2020
- February 2020
- January 2020
- December 2019
- November 2019
- September 2018
- October 2017
- December 2011
- August 2010