The European Commission investigates the Pornhub and other porn platforms for the protection of minors
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The European Commission began to investigate pornographic PornHub, StripChat, Xnxx and XVideos platforms for alleged infringements of Law on digital services (DSD), EU regulations on online platforms, relating to the protection of minors. Among these is the risk that age verification measures Applied by the sites are ineffective.
The Commission has already shownbased on reports and requests for previous information, that companies have not applied appropriate measures and provided to guarantee a high level of privacy, safety and protection of minors, in particular with tools for Age verification to protect minors of adult content.
According to the Commission, In addition, the sites did not carry out risk assessments They did not mitigate the negative effects on children’s rights, nor did they use adequate tools to verify age to prevent minors from accessing the content of adults.
The protection of young users online is one of the main priorities of the application of the Law on the protection of minors. The Commission was launched Various research on protection of minors according to the standards of the platforms, including Facebook and Instagram, of Meta.
The DSA entered into force for the first lot of the largest online platforms in 2023, including Facebook, Tiktok, X and Amazon. The commission included platforms Pornographic in the field of standards that affect very large online platforms (or Vlop) After exceeding the threshold of 45 million of average monthly users.
Currently designates 25 platforms As Vlop, and also started studying the infringements of the DSA of Temu, X, Tiktok and Meta. None of the investigations have still concluded. The EU executive said Stripchat will no longer be designated as Vlop After providing the user’s figures below the threshold. The decision will be applied within four months.
For the investigations started on Tuesday, The Commission has collaborated with the Member Statesthrough the European Council of Digital Services, which has jointly launched a coordinated action to protect minors regarding Pornographic content on smaller platforms. National authorities are responsible for the supervision of all companies that are lower than 45 million average monthly users.
During the investigation, the investigations could be expanded with other elements within the framework of the APD. At the beginning of this month, the The Commission has launched a public consultation on its guidelines For the protection of online minors, aimed at helping online platforms to guarantee a high level of privacy, safety and protection of children online.
