PARIS — Several weeks after targeting five leading adult tube sites, France’s media regulator ARCOM has initiated a new legal action, this time demanding that the country’s ISPs totally block MindGeek-owned sites YouPorn and RedTube over their alleged lack of enforcement of a controversial age verification mandate.
As XBIZ reported last month, following months of statements and threats pressuring tube sites to implement vaguely defined age verification schemes, ARCOM went to court to demand that French ISPs block Pornhub — also owned by MindGeek — as well as Tukif, xHamster, Xvideos and Xnxx.
Tube sites in France have typically asked users to confirm through a pop-up that they are over 18 before accessing adult content.
“This measure does not make it possible to guarantee that only an adult is likely to access the pornographic content available,” ARCOM asserted through a statement.
ARCOM is a recently-formed agency that superseded former regulatory agency CSA, an analog of the American FCC.
ARCOM sent a “double formal notice” to MG Freesites Ltd. — MindGeek’s corporate site operator — giving YouPorn and RedTube 15 days to “find a more robust solution than the simple declaration of age,” wrote Marc Rees of French tech news site Next INpact, which for months has been tracking ongoing threats by the Macron government to censor many of the most popular adult tube sites.
France’s age-verification mandate was surreptitiously added to a hastily approved domestic violence law during an atypical and sparsely attended COVID-era session of the French Parliament in July 2020.
The law specifies that adult companies should be required to institute measures beyond simply asking an internet user whether they are of age. It also allows a government official — the president of ARCOM — to demand that the president of the judicial court order the ISP providers to immediately block infringing sites in the entire country.
The current action against RedTube and YouPorn has now been added to those already in progress against Pornhub, xHamster and other tube sites.
The main French ISPs — Orange, Orange Caraïbe, Free, Free Mobile, Bouygues Télécom, Colt Technologies Services, SFR, SFR Fiber SAS, the Société Réunionnaise du Radiotéléphone and Outremer Télécom — have been summoned to a “blocking hearing” set for May 24.
According to ARCOM, the ISPs have lodged their concerns that the block mandate would place them “in a situation of legal uncertainty linked to the absence of ‘guidelines’ published by ARCOM concerning the satisfactory technical methods of restricting access to a minor.”
'Children's Rights' Groups Lead France's War on Porn
ARCAM's legal actions are being fueled by three nonprofit groups purporting to represent children’s rights: the Observatoire de la Parentalité et de l’Éducation Numérique, the Union Nationale des Associations Familiales and the Conseil Français des Associations Pour les Droits de l’Enfant. In late 2021, the groups identified eight “pornographic sites” they said should be censored for alleged violations of the July 2020 law.
Several other groups, with unclear agendas but also claiming to support “protecting children,” are also spearheading attempts to prevent French people from accessing what the groups consider “pornographic websites,” which could include any site that may feature explicit sexual expression, like Twitter.
Justine Atlan, a spokesperson for one of the organizations, e-Enfance, told AFP in December that “it is important to put pressure on pornographic sites so that they cannot continue to violate the legal framework of the industry they have chosen, which stipulates not to expose minors to pornography.”
Atlan claims that “the current internet pornography has more violent content, ‘revenge porn’ and sex without consent. This has consequences on the sexual practices that young people reproduce — brutality, problem of consent, pressure [linked to] performance.”
The nonprofits leading France’s War on Porn, e-Enfance and the Voice of the Child, are actively calling for the blocking of Pornhub, mrSex, herePorn, Youlike, xnxx, xHamster, xVideos, YouPorn and RedTube.
In a parallel legal action prompted by these groups, the Court of Appeals will decide on May 19 whether it will help those organizations shut down access to free adult content for the entire country.
Noting that a simple “Press here” button stating ‘I’m 18 or over’ would no longer suffice, last month, Next INpact’s Marc Rees tweeted that “Adult sites, which are not illegal in and of themselves, must find another method.”
“But which solution?” Rees added, pointing out that the June 2020 legislation that triggered this enforcement action did not offer anything beyond a rhetorical “pirouette” to dance around the complex issue of mandatory age verification.
Similar initiatives to prevent access to adult tube sites are currently afoot in the U.K. and Germany.
