Pornhub goes dark in Arkansas after age verification law kicks in::Pornhub operator MindGeek has blocked all users in Arkansas from the site after the state’s new age verification law went into effect.

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[–] [B] 236 points 3 years ago (9 children)

This is the best summary I could come up with:


Pornhub operator MindGeek has blocked all users in Arkansas from the site after the state’s new age verification law went into effect on Tuesday.

The Arkansas law, SB 66, doesn’t ban Pornhub from operating in the state, but it requires porn sites to verify that a user is 18 by confirming their age with identifying documents.

On Wednesday, Pornhub blocked all traffic from IP addresses based in Arkansas in protest, arguing that the law, which was intended to protect children, actually harms users.

“While safety and compliance are at the forefront of our mission, giving your ID card every time you want to visit an adult platform is not the most effective solution for protecting our users, and in fact, will put children and your privacy at risk,” MindGeek wrote in a message replacing the site’s front page for affected users.

Responding to this wave of bans, MindGeek has decided to block access to its sites from states where the laws have gone into effect.

So, instead of rolling out age verification systems, it says it decided to block access entirely, calling on users to contact their state representatives to oppose these laws.


I'm a bot and I'm open source!

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    [–] 203 points 3 years ago (6 children)

    Arkansas: your kids should be working in a mine, not wanking online

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    [+] 128 points 3 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (13 children)
  • [–] 31 points 3 years ago

    To be fair, porn is a little lower on the "first they came for the -----" list than he was probably expecting. He likely thought he had a few more marginalized groups to take the fall before the leopards started eating HIS face. But yeah, reap what you sow.

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    [–] 126 points 3 years ago (31 children)

    Oh no. I'm in Arkansas.

    Guess I'll turn on the VPN.

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  • [–] 114 points 3 years ago (14 children)
  • [–] 50 points 3 years ago (6 children)

    I grew up there. The northern part of the state is honestly one of the prettiest parts of our country. It is also filled with some of the most vile people. Vile people from everywhere else go there to retire and add to the smegma pot.

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    [–] 116 points 3 years ago (15 children)

    The party of small government.

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    [–] 94 points 3 years ago (18 children)

    Who in their right mind would expect a free porn site to go to this level of hassle?

    Or is this a puritanical measure in disguise?

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  • [–] 103 points 3 years ago (8 children)

    It's the second one. I saw article where they talked how Florida was the first to pass it, pornhub put time and money into developing what they needed to comply and saw a 90% decrease in traffic because nobody wants to hand over their ID for free porn.

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  • [–] 42 points 3 years ago (2 children)

    After MindGeek started complying with the Louisiana law earlier this year, the company said traffic dropped by 80 percent.

    It’s literally in the linked article lol

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    [–] 88 points 3 years ago (12 children)

    Didn't read the bill cause pdf and cause it's a bill, but found another article describing it, and it says at the end:

    The bill also would apply to material that as a whole lacks serious "literary, artistic, political, and scientific value for minors."

    Isn't that like 99% of the internet?

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    [–] 78 points 3 years ago (1 child)

    Things you aren't legally allowed to do in Arkansas: watch porn, have an abortion, read, write, or wipe your ass.

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    [–] 71 points 3 years ago (18 children)

    Dang, if kids just had some kind of guardians that would be responsible for their media consumption while every media device out there had basic functionality to support such supervision.

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    [–] 49 points 3 years ago (4 children)

    In other, unrelated news, VPN’s are experiencing an unexpected spike in traffic. More at 5.

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  • [+] 45 points 3 years ago* (last edited 3 years ago) (1 child)
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    [–] 45 points 3 years ago* (last edited 3 years ago) (12 children)

    I wanna see over the next year how rape and sexual harassment rates change.

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    [–] 41 points 3 years ago

    Well, that basically is an age check. People of Arkansas are obviously not old enough to deal with porn when they support a government that produces such stupid laws.

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  • [–] 35 points 3 years ago (5 children)

    Won't someone think of the horny Arkansans?

    Seriously the Republicans are beyond the pale.

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    [–] 33 points 3 years ago (11 children)

    I remember reading about this before. This is so stupid. Making people verify with offical documents.. People are going to get their documents stolen so much more now. Nice job Arkansas!

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    [–] 33 points 3 years ago (1 child)

    Freedum loving repubeicans inbound to other states?

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    [–] 32 points 3 years ago* (2 children)

    Is this a scheme of VPN providers? Do they pay off politicians?

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  • [–] 30 points 3 years ago (4 children)

    It's downright hypocritical that MindGeek has been outright supportive of the UK government's efforts to push age verification checks on porn and have even tried to lobby our country to implement AgeID as the solution.

    But the moment US states start demanding that they verify user ages, they start geoblocking.

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    [+] 30 points 3 years ago* (5 children)
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    [–] 26 points 3 years ago (2 children)

    Verification should be a 2fa letter with the logo on the envelope.

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    [–] 25 points 3 years ago (3 children)

    Xhamster is now requiring personal identification for EVERYONE in the whole US, not just in Arkansas. WTF?!

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    [–] 25 points 3 years ago (2 children)

    Pornhub's site was already pretty dark. Like it's mainly black

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