Texas Age Verification Bill Would Plaster Health Warnings On Porn Sites

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Searches for VPN Skyrocket in Texas After Pornhub Shuts Down Access in State

Searches by Texas users for the term "VPN" jumped more than fourfold after Pornhub disabled access in the state.

variety.com

Searches for VPN Skyrocket in Texas After Pornhub Shuts Down Access in State​

By Todd Spangler

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https://variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Pornhub.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1

Ethan Miller/Getty Images

Searches by Texas users for the term “VPN” jumped more than fourfold after Pornhub and its parent company’s network of other pornography websites disabled access in the state this week, according to Google data.

VPNs, or virtual private networks, establish an encrypted connection between a user and the public internet — and they can also mask the location of user, making it appear as if they’re accessing the internet from another state or country.

A number of Texans evidently have a newfound interest in location-spoofing VPN services, coming after Pornhub and other affiliated adult websites on March 14 blocked access to users in the state to protest Texas’ age-verification law requiring pornography sites to institute age-verification measures to ensure only adults 18 and older are able to access them.

A new message displayed Thursday on Pornhub (and other sites operated by parent company Aylo) to users with internet addresses registered to ISPs in Texas explained that it was disabling access to comply with the law. The company claims it has long supported age-verification access measures, but criticized the Texas law as “ineffective, haphazard and dangerous” because it forces users to provide identification every time they visit an adult-content platform rather than verifying users’ ages on their devices.

“Until the real solution is offered, we have made the difficult decision to completely disable access to our website in Texas,” the message on Pornhub and other Aylo sites said. “In doing so, we are complying with the law, as we always do, but hope that governments around the world will implement laws that actually protect the safety and security of users.”

Of the 20 metro areas tracked by Google, the highest search interest in VPNs over that the past seven days was in Dallas-Ft. Worth, followed by Houston, Austin, Waco-Temple-Bryan and San Antonio.

Here’s the Google Trends chart showing relative search interest in the term “VPN” over the past seven days in Texas:

Aylo is owned by Canadian private-equity firm Ethical Capital Partners, which acquired Pornhub’s predecessor company MindGeek for undisclosed financial terms last year.

In a statement, Alex Kekesi, Aylo’s VP of brand and community, said about the situation in Texas: “This is not the end. We are reviewing options and consulting with our legal team… We will continue to fight for our industry and the performers that legally earn a living, and we will continue to appeal through all available judicial recourse to recognize that this law is unconstitutional.”

Pornhub and Aylo’s network of other sites — which include Brazzers, RedTube, YouPorn, Mofos and Reality Kings — are also blocked or restricted in at least seven other U.S. states where similar laws have been enacted: Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, North Carolina, Virginia and Utah.

 

[WIA20XX]

Texas Sues xHamster and Chaturbate

Attorney General Ken Paxton is suing the porn sites after having also sued Pornhub, complaining that the sites are not complying with Texas' age verification law.

www.404media.co

Attorney General Ken Paxton is suing the porn sites after having also sued Pornhub, complaining that the sites are not complying with Texas' age verification law.

 

[Amare's Right Hook]

I'm will sue X Videos for deleting all the good s-hit.

 

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Texas sues owners of porn sites Chaturbate, xHamster over age-verification law

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has sued two more pornography companies that he says are violating a Texas age-verification law.

www.fox4news.com

Texas sues Chaturbate, xHamster owners over age-verification law​

By FOX 4 Staff

Updated March 21, 2024 4:16pm CDT

Texas

FOX 4

FOX 4 All Day: March 21, 2024​

Dallas-Fort Worth news headlines and the weather forecast for March 21, 2024.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has sued two more pornography companies that he says are violating a Texas age-verification law.

Paxton filed suit against Multi Media LLC and Hammy Media, which operate sites including Chaturbate and xHamster.

The suit says the companies are in violation of House Bill 1181, which requires commercial entities that show sexual material to "use reasonable age verification methods […] to verify that an individual attempting to access the material is 18 years of age or older."

READMOER: Pornhub disables Texas users access to the site

Companies that do not comply could be fined up to $10,000 per day, $10,000 more per day if the company illegally retains identifying information and $250,000 if a child views pornographic content without proper verification under the law.

Porn companies sued, saying the law violated the First Amendment, but Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling upheld the age-verification requirement in a ruling earlier this month.

The attorney general previously sued Aylo, the parent company of the site Porhub.

Pornhub announced they would disable the site in Texas on March 14.

In a statement the company called HB1181 "ineffective, haphazard and dangerous."

Pornhub decided to disable access to their site in Texas until a real solution is offered, they stated. "The safety of our users is one of our biggest concerns. We believe that the only effective solution for protecting minors and adults alike is to verify users’ age on their devices and to either deny or allow access to age-restricted materials and websites based on that verification. We call on all adult sites to comply with the law."

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Texas AG Ken Paxton Sues xHamster and Chaturbate AVN

Age verification lawsuits against xHamster and Chaturbate have been filed by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.

avn.com

Texas AG Ken Paxton Sues xHamster and Chaturbate​

March 20, 2024 6:15 PM EDT Legal - By

Michael McGrady Jr

Tech

AUSTIN, Texas—Ken Paxton, the far-right attorney general of Texas, has sued the parent companies of adult websites xHamster.com and Chaturbate.com, reports Austin NBC affiliate KXAN.

Paxton filed the complaints in Travis County against Hammy Media and Multi Media for violations of Texas House Bill (HB) 1181, the controversial age verification law that is currently being litigated between porn stakeholders and Paxton's office in a federal district court.

The news about these suits comes weeks after Paxton's office sued Aylo, the parent company of Pornhub.

"Sites like PornHub are on the run because Texas has a law that aims to prevent them from showing harmful, obscene material to children," Paxton said in a post on X.

"We recently secured a major victory against PornHub and other sites that sought to block this law from taking effect," he added. "In Texas, companies cannot get away with showing porn to children. If they don’t want to comply, good riddance."

Paxton argues that Aylo and its affiliated properties violated HB 1181, a "copycat" age-gating law that specifically targets porn websites with requirements to verify that every user from Texas IP addresses is 18 or older.

According to Paxton's office, the Aylo suit is asking the court to impose fines of up to $1.6 million, plus $10,000 per day since September 19, 2023, the day HB 1181 entered force. That sum could surpass $3.2 million for Aylo.

Less than one week ago, on March 14, Aylo geo-blocked the state of Texas due to the ongoing battle over its age verification legislation—thus marking the largest state to date where the company has chosen to block visitors to Pornhub and its other portfolio of sites.

This is a developing story.

 

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Google shows which parts of Texas are hit hardest by Pornhub's ban

Google search trends show how Texans reacted to a law requiring porn sites to verify a user's age, which led to Pornhub banning the state's visitors.

www.mysanantonio.com

Porn sites are banning Texas. Here's what Texans are Googling in response​

If the people around you seem a little more tense, here's why.​

By Warren Brown
March 23, 2024

Thumb down or dislike button on keyboard.

fongfong2/Getty Images/iStockphoto

I'm calling it now — this is going to be the year of cold showers in Texas. Pornhub may have been the first, or at least the most high profile, adult website to ban Texas users but others are following suit.

As of this week, porn site xHamster blocked Texas users while Chaturbate, a cam site, has added a system requiring users to provide a driver's license to access the site. All that after Lone Star Attorney General Ken Paxton slapped the parent companies of these sites with lawsuits seeking massive fines.

Spankbang.com went the same route as Chaturbate in what appears to be a growing trend. At this rate, convenient access to porn may soon be a fond memory for millions of residents.

So, if the people around you at work, home, or in the streets seem a little more tense — and maybe you're that person — you can thank Paxton for that, at least in part.

But one thing the whole debacle has provided a reminder of is just how horny the Lone Star State is. The amount of search traffic related to these sites going incognito and for virtual private network (VPN) services to circumvent the bans has been awe inspiring.

Looking at Google's search traffic after Pornhub's block went into effect provided a chuckle when the notoriously religious and conservative East Texas ranked top in Texas for searches of "how to access Pornhub."

But the topic deserves a deeper dive, so let's look at what parts of Texas are hardest hit by the bans. And to clear the air, there's no judgement here on these searches from my fellow Texans, just some context of how our state has reacted to the enforcement of a law passed by the conservative majority in the state capitol.

Texas' top searches after Pornhub's ban​

For these thirsty search terms, we'll look at Thursday, March 14, through Friday, March 22. That's the time frame from when Pornhub's ban went into effect through the time this story was written. Google's data may get updates over time.

One of the top searches for that time period — up 3,500% — was " how to watch porn in Texas?" Lubbock scored highest and the East Texas region of Tyler-Longview and Lufkin Nacogdoches searched for the term second most. Corpus Christ came third, followed by the region encompassing Waco, Temple, and Bryan at No. 4. The top five was rounded out by Austin and San Antonio finished No. 7.

The top search term for VPNs in Texas was " free VPN." The search traffic for this is a close race near the top, but Austin ranked No. 1, followed by Waco, Temple, and Bryan at No. 2; Lubbock at No. 3; DFW at No. 4; and Wichita Falls and Lawton, Oklahoma, at No. 5. San Antonio fell to No. 8 for this search.

Another popular search term is "Pornhub alternatives." Abilene and Sweetwater make an appearance as the area searching the most for this, by a healthy margin. Austin landed spot No. 2; Corpus Christi was No. 3; Amarillo was No. 4; and the East Texas region appears again at No. 5. San Antonio followed closely at No. 6.

Other "breakout" search terms, which means they were up 5,000% or more, include: How to access Pornhub in Texas; VPN; Pornhub VPN; Pornhub access; porn websites; and top porn sites. The list goes on and on with untold numbers of Texans scrambling to find ways to stimulate their visual cortex before they stimulate other things.

The law causing all this was passed by Texas' conservative House, Senate, and Republican Gov. Greg Abbott and requires sites serving pornography to verify the age of visitors before letting them access the content.

The existing system of "click here if you're over 18" doesn't stand up any longer under the law which just recently went into effect after a temporary stay was defeated in court. For a more in-depth look, or if you're wondering why people are resorting to VPNs, here's some suggested MySA reading.

 

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Kansas moves to join Texas and other states in requiring porn sites to verify people's ages

Kansas is poised to require internet pornography sites to verify that visitors are adults. It would join Texas and a handful of other states despite concerns about privacy and how broadly the law could be applied.

apnews.com

Kansas moves to join Texas and other states in requiring porn sites to verify people’s ages​

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Kansas House Judiciary Committee Chair Susan Humphries, R-Wichita, watches an electronic tally vote as the House approves a bill requiring pornography websites to verify the ages of their Kansas visitors, Tuesday, March 26, 2024, at the Statehouse in Topeka, Kan. The measure is likely to be come law and have Kansas joining at least eight other states in requiring age verification. (AP Photo/John Hanna)

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Kansas state Reps. Jesse Borjon, right, R-Topeka, and Mark Schreiber, left, R-Emporia, confer before the House convenes its daily session, Tuesday, March 26, 2024, at the Statehouse in Topeka, Kan. Both lawmakers support a bill to require pornography websites to verify that Kansas visitors are at least 18. (AP Photo/John Hanna)

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Kansas state Rep. Nick Hoheisel, R-Wichita, watches an electronic tally board in the House as it approves a bill requiring pornography websites to verify the age of Kansas visitors, Tuesday, March 26, 2024, at the Statehouse in Topeka, Kan. The measure is going to Gov. Laura Kelly, and at least eight other states have such laws. (AP Photo/John Hanna)

BY JOHN HANNA AND SEAN MURPHY

Updated 2:54 PM EDT, March 26, 2024


TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas is poised to require pornography websites to verify visitors are adults, a move that would follow Texas and a handful of other states despite concerns about privacy and how broadly the law could be applied.

The Republican-controlled Kansas Legislature passed the proposal Tuesday, sending it to Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly. The House voted for it 92-31 and the Senate approved it unanimously last month. Kelly hasn’t announced her plans, but she typically signs bills with bipartisan backing, and supporters have enough votes to override a veto anyway.

At least eight states have enacted age-verification laws since 2022 — Texas, Arkansas, Indiana, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, Utah and Virginia, and lawmakers have introduced proposals in more than 20 other states, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures and an analysis from The Associated Press of data from the Plural bill-tracking service.

Weeks ago, a federal appeals court upheld the Texas age-verification requirement as constitutional and a the Oklahoma House sent a similar measure to the state Senate.

Supporters argue that they’re protecting children from widespread pornography online. Oklahoma Rep. Toni Hasenbeck, a sponsor of the legislation, said pornography is dramatically more available now than when “there might be a sixth-grade boy who would find a Playboy magazine in a ditch somewhere.”

“What is commonplace in our society is for a child to be alone with their digital device in their bedroom,” said Hasenbeck, a Republican representing a rural southwest Oklahoma district.

In Kansas, some critics questioned whether the measure would violate free speech and press rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment. Last year, that issue was raised in a federal lawsuit over the Texas law from the Free Speech Coalition, a trade association for the adult entertainment industry.

A three-judge panel of the conservative, New Orleans-based Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found that Texas’ age-verification requirement did not violate the First Amendment. The judges concluded that such a law can stand as long as a state has a rational basis for it and states have a legitimate interest in blocking minors’ access to pornography.

The Kansas bill would make it a violation of state consumer protection laws for a website to fail to verify that a Kansas visitor is 18 if the website has material “harmful to minors.” The attorney general then could go to court seeking a fine of up to $10,000 for each violation. Parents also could sue for damages of at least $50,000.

Under an existing Kansas criminal law, material is harmful to minors if it involves “nudity, sexual conduct, sexual excitement or sadomasochistic abuse.”

But critics of the bill, mostly Democrats, argued that the law could be interpreted broadly enough that LGBTQ+ teenagers could not access information about sexual orientation or gender identity because the legal definition of sexual conduct includes acts of “homosexuality.” That means “being who we are” is defined as harmful to minors, said Rep. Brandon Woodard, who is gay and a Kansas City-area Democrat.

Woodard also said opponents don’t understand “how technology works.” He said people could bypass an age-verification requirement by accessing pornography through the dark web or unregulated social media sites.

Other lawmakers questioned whether the state could prevent websites based outside Kansas from retaining people’s personal information.

“The information used to verify a person’s age could fall into the hands of entities who could use it for fraudulent purposes,” said southeastern Kansas Rep. Ken Collins, one of two Republicans to vote against the bill.

Yet even critics acknowledged parents and other constituents have a strong interest in keeping minors from seeing pornography. Another southeastern Kansas Republican, Rep. Chuck Smith, chided the House because it didn’t approve the bill unanimously, as the Senate did.

“Kids need to be protected,” he said. “Everybody in here knows what pornography is — everybody.”