TOPEKA, Kan. — The National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCOSE), a conservative anti-pornography organization, has sued four adult websites in Kansas under the state's age verification law.
The lawsuit, brought on behalf of a 14-year-old Kansas resident and her mother, targets Chaturbate.com, Jerkmate.com, Superporn.com and Titan Websites. The suit alleges that the teen, identified as "Q.R.," accessed content on all four sites without her age being verified.
"Kansas law requires pornography companies to implement reasonable age verification methods, and the companies named in these lawsuits failed to do so," said Dani Pinter, NCOSE senior vice president and director of the organization's law center.
Pinter went on to claim, "It is unreasonably dangerous for these pornography websites to provide this product which they know is harmful to children, that children are drawn to access, and do access, without employing age verification as required by Kansas law."
As XBIZ has reported, NCOSE, which represents itself as an anti-trafficking organization, is largely an anti-porn lobbying group with roots in the religious conservative movement.
Adult industry attorney and First Amendment expert Corey D. Silverstein noted that the lawsuit will likely face constitutional challenges.
"The defenses that I'm sure these websites will aggressively pursue will surely include the constitutionality of Kansas' AV law itself," Silverstein said.
He also pointed out that, with the Texas age verification case still pending in front of the United States Supreme Court, the lawsuit is jumping the gun.
"While the allegations sound bad, they are all unproven and the defendants will have their opportunity to tell their side of the story in court," Silverstein said. "Kansas didn't bother waiting to hear what the U.S. Supreme Court has to say about the age verification laws in its upcoming opinion on the Texas AV law, which is expected to be released within the next 60 days."
Kansas’ age verification law, which requires that adult sites meet "reasonable" age verification standards, sets penalties of up to $10,000 per violation, per day.
