Porn Website Blocks Utah Over Age Verification Law

As of Monday, a Utah law requires pornography websites to verify the age of anyone visiting those sites from Utah. In protest of the age-verification law, one of the world’s biggest purveyors of online filth has blocked all Utah IP addresses from accessing the site.

As Salt Lake City’s Fox13 reports:

Pornhub, one of the largest adult content websites on the internet, has blocked Utahns from viewing the site in an apparent protest of a new law forcing stricter age-verification measures.

Website visitors from Utah started noticing the block on Monday morning. At first, Pornhub posted “403 | This state is not whitelisted.” 403 is a computer code for a forbidden site. Later in the day, the site was changed to a lengthy message to users notifying them of why they were blocked.

Anyone with a Utah IP address who visits the site is now presented with the following message:

As you may know, your elected officials in Utah are requiring us to verify your age before allowing you access to our website. While safety and compliance are at the forefront of our mission, giving your ID card every time you want to visit an adult platform is not the most effective solution for protecting our users, and in fact, will put children and your privacy at risk.

In addition, mandating age verification without proper enforcement gives platforms the opportunity to choose whether or not to comply. As we’ve seen in other states, this just drives traffic to sites with far fewer safety measures in place. Very few sites are able to compare to the robust Trust and Safety measures we currently have in place. To protect children and user privacy, any legislation must be enforced against all platforms offering adult content.

The safety of our users is one of our biggest concerns. We believe that the best and most effective solution for protecting children and adults alike is to identify users by their device and allow access to age-restricted materials and websites based on that identification. Until a real solution is offered, we have made the difficult decision to completely disable access to our website in Utah.

Please contact your representatives before it is too late and demand device-based verification solutions that make the internet safer while also respecting your privacy.

The notice is accompanied by a video — since visitors do not exactly visit the site so that they can read something.

Both the notice and the video are simply overflowing with language about “robust Trust and Safety measures,” how “the safety of [the site’s] users is one of [their] biggest concerns,” how concerned they are that Utah’s law to help prevent children from watching online porn “will put children and your privacy at risk,” and, oh, how much they care about “respecting your privacy.”

Of course, none of it is true. Spoiler alert: The porn industry does not care about people.

As to the existence of “robust Trust and Safety measures” and the protection of children, a New York Times op-ed from 2020 blows the lid right off of that crock of excrement. That piece — titled, “The Children of Pornhub” — showcases many instances of underage girls being exploited by the site publishing videos of those poor young girls being sexually abused. Warning, the piece is heart-rending, difficult reading. The value in the piece is found in the fact that no one who reads it can reasonably think that porn sites in general — and this site in particular — do not knowingly and willingly profit from the rape and exploitation of children.

Where are those “robust Trust and Safety measures” while child rape is monetized and the minds of porn consumers are further poisoned for profit? How is “the safety of [the site’s] users is one of [their] biggest concerns” while those users are being infested with cancer for their souls and minds? Where is there any thought for “privacy” on a site that amasses a fortune by publishing child rapes, revenge pornography, spy-cam videos of women showering, and more?

This writer addressed the privacy issue of online porn in a podcast episode back in 2020. In that episode, I asked how a multibillion-dollar industry can afford to produce or purchase HD video, serve it up at streaming speeds for free, and still be a multibillion-dollar industry. The answer is simple: Those sites pilfer your data, track you across the web, and sell your private information to the highest bidders. Did you really expect any better from sites that offer the pain, degradation, torture, humiliation, and exploitation of human persons for the entertainment of other human persons?

That episode drills down into the statistics of the porn industry, and it is not a pretty sight. Human suffering is at the heart of the porn industry, and women in the industry — even those who are there “willingly” — take the brunt of it.

As to the promises of giving a darn about privacy, Pornhub’s claim that “we believe that the best and most effective solution for protecting children and adults alike is to identify users by their device” should be understood to mean that the site and its owners want even more access to users’ personal data.

At any rate, it is clear that the site is merely using this as a cheap publicity stunt. As Fox13 reports:

Pornhub and other sites previously protested a law the Utah State Legislature passed in 2020 requiring adult websites to have a warning label with an opt-in message, arguing it was unconstitutional. But ultimately, many of the sites started putting up the warning labels to Utah visitors.

Utah is not the first state to mandate that porn sites verify that visitors are legally old enough to come to their sites. Louisiana has a similar law. That law has been in effect since January 1, and Pornhub and other sites have been in compliance. As Yahoo Sports reports:

The sponsor of the Utah legislation, Sen. Todd Weiler, R-Woods Cross, pointed to recent Louisiana legislation as a model and expressed surprise at Pornhub’s action.

“(I) did not expect it at all,” Weiler told the Deseret News. He said he believes Pornhub, which began verifying ages when a similar law in Louisiana took effect at the beginning of the year, will end up complying with Utah’s law.

“It’s already illegal in all 50 states for children to view porn,” he said. “Businesses who sell tobacco, vaping products and alcohol online already age verify. Utah’s new law only requires adult sites to make reasonable efforts to confirm that the consumers of their content are adults.”

Of the site’s decision to block Utah IP addresses, Utah’s Republican Governor Spencer Cox said, “In Utah, we care about our kids. The vast majority of Utahns would agree that companies should be held responsible for knowingly distributing pornography to minors…. The very least we can do as a society is to ask companies to verify the age of those viewing the pornography they produce and distribute. This unanimous, bipartisan legislation provides multiple ways to satisfy that requirement.”

“However,” he added, “I fully support Pornhub’s decision to remove their content in Utah.”