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LONDON (AP) — European Union regulators said Tuesday they’re investigating four major porn websites over suspicions that they’ve breached the bloc’s online content rules that include provisions for protecting children from pornographic material.
The European Commission, the EU’s executive branch, said it has opened formal proceedings against Pornhub, Stripchat, XNXX and XVideos under the 27-nation bloc’s Digital Safety Act.
The sweeping rulebook, also known as the DSA, requires internet companies and online platforms to do more to protect users under threat of hefty fines worth up to 6% of annual global revenue.
The commission said protecting young users online is one of the DSA’s priorities and it will now carry out an in-depth investigation into the companies “as a matter of priority.”
The investigation will focus on the risks to protection of minors, including dangers associated with the lack of effective age verification measures.
It said the porn sites have failed to put in place “appropriate and proportionate measures” to a high level safety and security for minors, especially when it comes to age verification tools designed to prevent minors from getting to adult content.
The sites also lack “risk assessment and mitigation measures” of any negative effects, including on users mental and physical well-being, the commission said.
Pornhub, XNXX, Stripchat and XVideos were classed as “very large online platforms” that face the highest level of scrutiny under the DSA. However the commission said it granted Stripchat’s request to be removed from the list because it didn’t have enough users.
Pornhub’s parent company Aylo said it’s aware of the investigation and is “fully committed” to ensuring online safety of minors.
“We will always comply with the law, but we hope that governments around the world will implement laws that protect the safety and security of users,” the company said in a statement. Aylo said that “the real solution for protecting minors and adults alike” is to verify users’ ages with individual devices rather than having websites do it.
XNXX, Stripchat and XVideos didn’t respond to requests for comment.
“The online space should be a safe environment for children to learn and connect. Our priority is to protect minors and allow them to navigate safely online,” Henna Virkkunen, the Commission’s executive vice president for tech sovereignty, security and democracy, said in a statement.
Officials said the EU is also working on its own age-verification app that online platforms can use to verify if a user is over the age of 18, without revealing any other personal information. It will be available by the summer.
The investigation comes after the commission held a public consultation on draft online children protection measures that included proposals for age verification and “age estimation” methods to block young people from inappropriate content.
Along with the bloc-wide scrutiny of big sites, smaller porn platforms will also face supervision from individual EU member countries’s digital regulators, the Commission said.
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