Yesterday in Parliament the British Government tabled the last pieces of the legal jigsaw that had to be assembled to allow the British Board of Film Classification to begin their work of requiring commercial pornography sites to operate robust age verification services in order to ensure persons under the age of 18 cannot ordinarily access their content.
To coincide with this long awaited moment the BBFC have also launched their web site to provide members of the public with a run down of how the new system will work.
Both Houses of Parliament have to debate the orders that were laid. It is anticipated that will take place in late November with the actual commencement date likely to be set for two or three months after then. That’s when the serious business begins.
As D-Day approaches there will be an increased level of activity to ensure as many people as possible are aware of what the new regime will entail.
As we have repeatedly stated, all of the legal pornography that is on the internet today will still be there tomorrow. Any adult who wants to access it will still be able so to do.
The only change will be that adults will have to go through a privacy-preserving age verification mechanism, as they already have to with online gambling and a range of other legally age restricted services and products that are available over the internet.
In fact the age verification solutions which have emerged to cope with the anticipated demand for age verification on commercial pornography sites are among the most privacy-respecting apps ever to have been developed. Mindful of the key legal principle of data minimization, the only thing an age verification provider needs to satisfy themselves about is your age. Nothing else.
This has been a long time coming.
Desiderata 