UK Age Verification: Enforicing Online Safety Act

[Monke from Tropix 2]

Whole title: UK age verification is here: Ofcom set to begin enforcing Online Safety Act
Sites not complying with child age checks subject to huge fines

Jul 24, 2025, 12:55 pm EDT | Joel R. McConvey

The age assurance bell is tolling in the UK, where the Online Safety Act is set to take effect. The July 25 deadline has arrived and national regulator Ofcom is expected to commence enforcement of the Children’s Codes that require platforms to prevent minors from accessing harmful content such as self-harm, suicide and eating disorder content, as well as pornography. That means adult content sites operating without online age checks for their users will be subject to huge fines of up to 18 million pounds (about 2.4 million dollars U.S.) or 10 percent of global turnover, whichever is greater.

For users, the regulator has published a guide on what to expect, which also outlines the permitted methods for sites to check a user’s age: facial age estimation (FAE), open banking, digital ID services including wallets, credit card age checks, email-based age estimation or inference, mobile network operator age checks, and photo ID matching. (Those with a deeper attention span can watch adult star Ivy Maddox read the full text of the OSA.)

The UK age assurance sector has been anticipating this date (dubbed “AV Day” in industry lingo) for some time. The regulatory rigor that Ofcom has promised suggests an increased demand for age verification and age estimation products and services, as digital age checks stand to become common practice. Biometric Update and Goode Intelligence have published a Market Report and Buyer’s Guide for the UK market to help customers navigate the shift.

Some sites covered under the OSA and the Children’s Codes have already pledged to implement government-approved, highly effective age assurance measures in keeping with the law. But major sites such as Pornhub, owned by Aylo, continue to mount resistance against similar laws in the EU, recently shutting down access in France in response to its imposition of a standard for age verification to access adult sites.

More in this article includes:

• Industry bodies like the Age Verification Providers Association are preparing digital certification schemes to ensure genuine compliance and combat fake age-check claims.
• Providers such as Luciditi and Yoti report increased demand for their age assurance solutions and advocate for fair, consistent enforcement across all platforms.
• High-profile platforms including Pornhub, Discord, Reddit, and X (formerly Twitter) have committed to age-gating.
• Ofcom is already investigating noncompliant services.
• X in particular faces scrutiny due to the high prevalence of pornography exposure among young users on its platform, with potential fines reaching £200 million or so.

Article link: https://www.biometricupdate.com/202507/uk-age-verification-is-here-ofcom-set-to-begin-enforcing-online-safety-act

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While I appreciate that the UK are doing something for the safety of minors' Internet experience, I feel very... limited... if I were a UK citizen and I have to submit a face scan or my ID just to access some wank material. Any UK users here share their thoughts here?

 

[Webster]

To all the angry men online, putting face-scan checks on porn really isn’t about you

From today, websites that carry explicit content are required by law to ask for photo ID or bank account details in order to verify a user’s age, so that children can be protected – where’s the harm in that, asks Claire Cohen

www.independent.co.uk

Look, I’m not naive. I realise that this isn’t a panacea. The communications regulator Ofcom, which is responsible for implementing this, might be calling it a “big moment”, but it’s merely a first step, and not a foolproof one. Tech-savvy teens will find ways to access porn anyway – we all had fake IDs to buy alcopops, right? – and there are concerns that it will lead to children sharing more images of themselves. Not to mention the potential for data breaches. Remember the hack of the extramarital affairs website Ashley Madison in 2015, in which the details of its 37 million members were exposed?

On the other hand, as a parent, I’m desperate for something to change before my son starts school. It’s horrifying to think that he might have unrestricted access to the sort of material we know damages children's mental health and normalises violent sexual activity. No, age verification isn’t a whole solution, but it’s progress: as long as Ofcom actually enforces it and has the power to hold companies accountable, that is. And it’s still up to parents and schools to do their bit, too.


So, sorry to the porn-starved men of the internet, this really isn’t about making things harder for you – although, given that a 2023 Ofcom study found that a lot of porn is watched during work hours, maybe it’s no bad thing for them either. It’s about social change; telling our children that explicit pornography isn’t suitable for their age group. We may struggle to row back with those teens who are already hooked, but the message might filter down to younger generations yet to fall down the rabbit hole. It’s about what we tell them is normal in relationships and how their experience of using the internet should look.