If Pornhub was a cowboy, it just tipped its hat and rode off into the sunset to leave Texas. It is now unavailable in the state after the US 5th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Texas may begin enforcing age-verification rules for porn sites. whom 404Media reports that when you visit Pornhub or any other adult entertainment website owned by its parent company, Aylo, from within the state, you will now receive a message that begins: “Dear User, As you are aware, your elected officials in Texas require We will verify your age before allowing you to access our website.”
The message goes on to explain that the practice “would undermine the rights of adults to access protected speech” and that it is “the least effective and most restrictive means of achieving Texas’ purported goal of protecting minors.” Texas age verification regulations require porn website visitors to prove their age by presenting a copy of one of their state ID cards. Aylo said in his message that “providing an ID every time you want to visit an adult platform is not an effective solution to protect users online and actually puts minors and your privacy at risk.”
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signed the age-verification bill last year, but a group of porn sites, including Pornhub, sued a month later to block it. The judge issued a preliminary injunction blocking its immediate enforcement, ruling that the plaintiffs had shown that they would be “violated if the law were enacted” and would “suffer irreparable harm.” However, state Attorney General Ken Paxton (pictured above) appealed the decision. The court struck down the law’s requirement to “display a health warning about the effects of pornography consumption,” but Paxton clearly won the battle.
Pornhub’s message to Texas visitors to visitors from other states with similar age verification laws, including Utah, Montana, North Carolina ; and Mississippi. Last year, Aylo also started demanding Louisiana visitors apply to verify their identity through the state’s digital driver’s license wallet program, but most states do not have a comparable program that works with its system. “We believe that the only effective solution to protect both minors and adults is to verify users’ age on their devices and, based on that verification, deny or allow access to age-restricted materials and websites,” Aylo said in a message.
It was quite entertaining, but a jump in the expected course of events Google search for “VPN”. after the judgment of the appellate court. As you might have guessed, Texas now tops the list of states for VPN searches, indicating that people are looking for ways to bypass Pornhub’s shutdown in the region.
