CARE disputes Ofcom's Age Verification Report

Today, CARE is challenging Ofcom’s claim that 66 out of the top 100 porn sites in the UK are providing ‘highly effective’ age assurance controls.

On Thursday 16 July, Ofcom published a report ahead of the one-year anniversary of age verification coming into force as part of the Online Safety Act.

They said in the report that 66 out of the top 100 dedicated porn sites in the UK are meeting the standard that Parliament set of providing ‘highly effective’ age assurance controls.

However, social policy charity CARE conducted its own research between 9-16 July. It revealed less than half – 44 – of the top 100 porn sites were in reality providing age assurance that meets Ofcom’s own standard for ‘highly effective’.

Disturbingly, only five of the UK’s top 10 sites meet Ofcom’s and Parliament's ‘highly effective’ standard.

Some 26 sites had made some attempt to implement ‘highly effective’ age assurance but fell short of the standard. Some 15 out of these 26 sites allowed access to highly explicit thumbnails before the verification process, which would fail the tests set by Ofcom.

And 18 out of the 26 sites meanwhile had explicit, visible titles before age assurance controls. Shockingly, 30 sites had nothing in place at all.

In Volume 4 of 'Protecting children from harms online', Ofcom made it clear that for dedicated pornography services 'highly effective age assurance should be implemented either at the point of entry to the service or the provider must ensure that no harmful content is visible to users on entering the service before they have completed the age check.”

As a result of this serious discrepancy between Ofcom’s report published today and CARE’s own research, the charity is tonight asking Ofcom to clarify the different figures as soon as possible.

CARE’s online safety lead, Tim Cairns, said:

“While our data set might be different from the one Ofcom used, we would strongly dispute the claim by Ofcom that as many as 66 of the top 100 porn sites in the UK are providing highly effective age assurance controls.

“If you take Ofcom’s figure of 66, our research, conducted just days ago, only arrives at a similar figure only if you combine sites that have ‘highly effective’ age assurance with sites that just have some form of age checks in place.

“So, the question needs to be asked as to whether Ofcom is really and robustly applying its own standards when it comes to assessing whether porn sites really are applying the ‘highly effective’ standard for age assurance controls as approved by MPs when the legislation was going through Parliament.

“We recognise the top 100 porn sites in the UK is fluid data and does change from week to week.

"But in light of the very serious discrepancy between our research and that of Ofcom, the regulator needs to reassure the public that it has properly taken account of how frequently the data changes.

“And what is being done about the fact that just a few days ago, some 30 of the top 100 porn sites in the UK had absolutely no age assurance controls in place at all.

“We appreciate the huge remit Ofcom has, but strong and swift action against sites that fail to comply must now be enacted.”

ENDS

Notes to editors:

CARE is a social policy charity bringing a Christian perspective to matters of public policy.

Ofcom’s report on age assurance compliance can be viewed here: https://www.ofcom.org.uk/online-safety/protecting-children/age-checks-helping-make-online-experiences-safer-for-uk-children-but-job-not-done-and-tech-industry-must-act-to-strengthen-protections

For more information / interview requests: james.mildred@care.org.uk // 07717516814