Internet Porn Censorship

The Australian internet industry has produced draft censorship rules related to age/ID verification. The schedule is for these to come into force in 2025.

One of the rules that has caught the attention is that search engines will be required to age/ID verify users before links to porn or gambling sites sites can be provided.

The draft codes will apply to websites, social media, video games, search engines, gaming companies, app developers and internet service providers, among others.

As is the case in most other countries, the authorities are refusing to specify exactly what age/ID verification mechanisms will be acceptable and will leave it to companies to take enormous commercial risks in guessing what mechanisms will be acceptable. Examples of options include checking photo ID, facial age estimation, credit card checks, digital ID wallets or systems, or attestation by a parent or guardian.

The codes have been developed by the Australian Mobile Telecommunications Association (Amta), the Communications Alliance, the Consumer Electronics Suppliers Association (CESA), the Digital Industry Group Inc. (Digi), and the Interactive Games and Entertainment Association (IGEA).

Dr Jennifer Duxbury, Digi's director for policy, regulatory affairs, and research, told Guardian Australia that the group doesn't speak for the porn industry, and added:

I can't predict what their reaction might be, whether they would withdraw from the market, or what's the likely outcome.

A French Court of Appeals in Paris has ruled that certain porn websites are subject to a national age verification requirement adopted under a 2020 French law.

The ruling applies to websites that don't operate in European Union member states.

Websites Tukif, xHamster, MrSexe, and IciPorno, all non-EU platforms, must adopt more rigorous age verification measures within 15 days or else they will be blocked by French ISPs.

Porn websites are currently under duress via the EU and the websites are presently challenging Digital Services Act rules.

The Court of Appeal ruled that:

Children's general interest was an overriding consideration which may justify infringement of other rights such as freedom of expression or communication.

Giving priority to the protection of the private lives of adult consumers, by ruling out age verification, is incompatible with the protection of minors.

AVN also reported on a national age verification requirement granting Arcom, the audiovisual and internet censor for France, the right to enforce age-verification rules.

Ofcom writes:

Parliament set us a deadline of April 2025 to finalise our codes and guidance on illegal harms and children's safety. We will finalise our illegal harms codes and guidance ahead of this deadline. Our expected timing for key milestones over the next year -- which could change -- include:

• December 2024: Ofcom will publish first edition illegal harms codes and guidance. Platforms will have three months to complete illegal harms risk assessment.

• January 2025: Ofcom will finalise children's access assessment guidance and guidance for pornography providers on age assurance. Platforms will have three months to assess whether their service is likely to be accessed by children.

• February 2025: Ofcom will consult on best practice guidance on protecting women and girls online, earlier than previously planned. March 2025: Platforms must complete their illegal harms risk assessments, and implement appropriate safety measures.

• April 2025: Platforms must complete children's access assessments. Ofcom to finalise children's safety codes and guidance. Companies will have three months to complete children's risk assessment.

• Spring 2025: Ofcom will consult on additional measures for second edition codes and guidance.

• July 2025: Platforms must complete children's risk assessments, and make sure they implement appropriate safety measures.

We will review selected risk assessments to ensure they are suitable and sufficient, in line with our guidance, and seek improvements where we believe firms have not adequately mitigated the risks they face. Ready to take enforcement action.

Ofcom has the power to take enforcement action against platforms that fail to comply with their new duties, including imposing significant fines where appropriate. In the most serious cases, Ofcom will be able to seek a court order to block access to a service in the UK, or limit its access to payment providers or advertisers.

We are prepared to take strong action if tech firms fail to put in place the measures that will be most impactful in protecting users, especially children, from serious harms such as those relating to child sexual abuse, pornography and fraud.

Wild is a 2016 Germany drama by Nicolette Krebitz.
Starring Lilith Stangenberg and Georg Friedrich and Nelson.

Not submitted to the BBFC but it is available online on MUBI and Amazon Prime with a self applied 16+ rating. The film contains a scene where a wolf licks a woman's explicitly naked vagina.

Thanks to Mike who comments:

Wild is a highly regarded arthouse film about relationships, focusing on a discontented woman who starts a romantic relationship with a wolf....

Never seen in the UK before, it's recently been picked by MUBI. Not sure whether they intend to release it on physical media, but at the moment you can see it on the MUBI website and even on amazon prime video in the UK.

To cut a long story short, at around 52:30, there's a scene where a naked woman sitting on a toilet has her vagina (explicitly) licked for around 10 seconds by a wolf.

Presumably it's been released on streaming in the UK because it's not illegal under extreme pornography laws. The law and the CPS guidance specifically say that if an image forms part of a sequence of images, we should look to the wider sequence to decide if the image is a pornographic one. In this case the wider sequence of images (i.e. the film) isn't pornographic so the wolf image isn't pornographic and therefore it's legal. If that's true, then it's the first and only case since the act was implemented in 2008 in which a beasty image which would have been illegal in a pornographic film becomes legal in a conventional narrative film.

It is a possibility that MUBI are publishing it because they don't know the law. But that's unlikely - they know full well that the film is controversial, and they frequently submit films to the BBFC for classification on physical media, so they know the rules. They seem not to have submitted this one though.

Summary Notes

A strange encounter with a wild wolf at the edge of Ania's cold, mundane town sets off a deep-seated passion within her, shattering the drudgery of her dull days. Determined to hunt the untamed creature, she finds herself pulled to the natural world as a fearless lust for the wolf grows, eliciting a desire for her own sexuality and a disregard for social graces, repulsing yet attracting everyone around her. As the balance between the natural world and modern civilization begins to tip, so too do Ania's inhibitions, forcing her to question the glaring hypocrisies closing in on her.

Versions

uncut

Amazon Prime 16+

UK: Uncut and MUBI 16+ rated: MUBI/Amazon Prime VoD at UK Amazon