UK regulator Ofcom has opened an investigation into Pornhub operator Aylo’s use of Apple’s device-level age assurance to control access to the adult site. Ofcom is assessing whether Aylo’s implementation meets the Online Safety Act’s requirement for highly effective age checks; its inquiry is not directed at Apple’s age-verification technology.
Aylo says it received an Ofcom investigation letter dated September 21 and will cooperate with the regulator. It began restoring Pornhub access in May to eligible UK iPhone users who had confirmed their adult status through Apple’s age-verification process. The arrangement lets the site rely on a device-level age signal instead of requiring those users to complete a separate check on Pornhub. Apple asks some users whose ages cannot be established from account information to verify with an identity document.
Ofcom has raised concerns that Aylo may not have done enough due diligence and testing before adopting the process. Ofcom says some of its checks indicated that children could access the site despite the age-control process. Under the law, responsibility for preventing minors from encountering pornography rests with the service provider, regardless of where in the user journey the age check takes place. An investigation is not a final determination that Aylo breached that duty.
Aylo argues that device-level checks can protect children across multiple websites while reducing the need for people to submit personal information to individual adult sites. The company says Apple’s approach offers strong protection and that it is prepared to provide technical evidence to Ofcom. Its response puts the effectiveness of an operating-system signal, and a website’s reliance on it, at the center of the dispute.
The case comes as the UK has been moving toward device-level child protections and adult age checks. Earlier age-verification pilots by UK platforms tested a range of ways to establish whether a user is an adult before access is granted.
Aylo’s arrangement relies on Apple to establish adult status and uses that signal to grant access to Pornhub. Ofcom is examining the safeguards Aylo applied to that step, including its testing of whether children could still reach the site.
Sources: Aylo, The Guardian
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By the ID Tech Editorial Team
