FSC Executive Director Delivers Keynote at UK Age Assurance Regulator Event
On July 16, 2024, Free Speech Coalition Executive Director Alison Boden delivered the keynote presentation at a meeting on age verification hosted by Ofcom, the UK’s communications regulator. The first-of-its-kind event was designed to facilitate discussion with the adult industry on Ofcom’s implementation of the Online Safety Act (OSA), including the age assurance and illegal content requirements for adult content platforms, both expected to come into force in Q1 of 2025.
Boden’s keynote on the age verification mandates being passed in the US focused on the many reasons that they should not act as a model for other jurisdictions. Setting aside the unconstitutionality of the US laws, Boden highlighted the bizarre ways content is defined, patchwork of age verification mechanisms prescribed, and disproportionate enforcement methods authorized by the 19 state age verification statutes in the US.
Boden outlined the serious barriers to compliance with these laws, including the enormous cost of implementing age verification services and the near-total refusal of consumers to age-verify to access adult content. She finished with four suggestions for regulators:
Make compliance requirements extremely clear and realistic for websites
Make efforts to improve consumer trust in age assurance
Take action to limit competitive advantage of non-compliance
Reduce the financial burden on businesses
“If regulators want to keep minors from accessing age-inappropriate material, it’s essential that our industry be at the table,” says Boden. “Regulations that are unevenly applied, that discourage compliance, and are rejected by consumers will inevitably fail. I’m thankful to Ofcom for inviting me, and to those in our industry who joined me to help educate the regulators.”
In March, FSC submitted a detailed critique of the age assurance guidance proposed by Ofcom under the OSA, which requires sites to ensure that “children cannot normally encounter” pornographic content by implementing some form of age assurance technology. The event was designed to facilitate discussion on the proposed regulations.
The hybrid event was attended by representatives from a variety of platforms that host adult content and began with remarks from Ofcom’s Online Safety Group Director. She related that the regulator hoped to create a "no surprises" compliance and enforcement regime that harmonizes with international standards and best practices.
Next, the attendees worked in small groups to provide feedback on Ofcom’s definition of “pornographic” content, which is vaguely defined in the OSA as “content of such a nature that it is reasonable to assume that it was produced solely or principally for the purpose of sexual arousal.” Ofcom’s attempt to clarify what content is and is not “pornographic” seemed complicated and vastly over-inclusive to many of the attendees, who encouraged the regulator to narrow and simplify their definition.
The event also included a presentation on what “highly effective age assurance” means in practice, which was largely a recitation of the criteria outlined in the proposed guidance. This was followed by a panel featuring representatives from Aylo, WGCZ, and Hammy Media discussing the trust and safety measures each platform employs.
The final presentation focused on how websites can prevent non-consensual intimate imagery (NCII), also known as “revenge porn,” on their platforms by using StopNCII.org’s hash lists. By simply integrating StopNCII’s API, services can check user-submitted content against their database of image and video hashes. Any platform wishing to thwart intimate image abuse by integrating the tool should email [email protected].
In her closing remarks, the Online Safety Supervision Director announced that Ofcom will be launching an awareness campaign in the fall to inform the industry about their obligations under the OSA. To facilitate this, Ofcome has created a one-stop landing page for adult content platforms at ofcom.org.uk/adultsonly with the proposals themselves, as well as ways to check whether the rules apply to your website. Platforms are encouraged to provide Ofcom’s Porn Supervision team with feedback.
FSC is pleased that, unlike the vast majority of policymakers, Ofcom is making a concerted effort to engage with the industry to understand our concerns. We hope that this will result in a workable policy for adult content websites and encourage all FSC members to reach out to Ofcom with feedback on how the requirements will affect their businesses.
