UK Adult Content Site Visits Declines Following Age Checks, Yet Virtual Private Network Use Spikes, Reports Watchdog

Access to adult content sites in the UK has fallen significantly since the enforcement of mandatory age verification earlier this year, as reported by the country's communications watchdog. Simultaneously, the use of tools designed to dodge these restrictions has surged.

Immediate Drop in User Figures Following Law Implementation

The introduction of age verification on 25 July led to an prompt decline in visits to major online adult platforms, such as the top provider in the UK. Figures indicates that visitor numbers to this site in August reached 9.8 million, a drop of 1.5 million from the same period in 2024.

In total, traffic to the 10 top adult services in the UK have now stabilized at a significantly reduced level than prior to the late July deadline. Subsequent data suggests this downward trend in site visits continued past August.

Surge in Virtual Private Network Adoption to Bypass Checks

Reacting to the new rules, use of VPN software—which can circumvent location-based blocks by masking connections via another country—more than doubled following 25 July.

User numbers peaked at more than 1.4 million in mid-August, up from approximately 650,000 users prior to the checks were introduced. Subsequently, the watchdog noted that VPN usage has since steadily declined, with latest numbers at approximately 900,000. It added that the level of regular VPN use is “much lower” than user numbers for adult services.

Teenagers Taking Action to Harmful Material

In other findings, the watchdog's annual study revealed that about 60% of young people aged 11 to 17 had taken action after encountering distressing content on the internet. Steps taken included flagging the content to the site to blocking the person who shared it.

This research was conducted prior to new rules took effect that require social media companies to stop children from accessing dangerous content, such as material related to suicide and pornography. The primary way teenagers came across such content was by scrolling through a social media timeline, suggesting that algorithms were serving harmful material.

Government Announce Review of Adult Content Legislation

In a related development, the government stated it would examine the legislation relating to pornography to assess whether it is effective in the modern online world.

“The review will look into the effectiveness of the existing law in relation to criminalising, for example, damaging portrayals of incest and any types of pornography which encourage child sexual abuse,” said a government official.

Campaigners Call For Tighter Online Controls

Campaigners for better control of adult content have urged the government to outlaw so-called “barely legal” material. This includes content featuring incest scenes or that appears to promote child sexual abuse by casting young-looking adults dressed as children.

Suggested changes to legislation aim to:

• Ban pornography where performers are mimicking children, often filmed in settings like children’s bedrooms.
• Broaden the offence of making an exploitative portrayal of a child to cover material where an older performer acts the part of a child.
• Apply stricter regulation on incest-themed pornography, which research suggests is heavily recommended by site systems.
• Introduce additional restrictions on “nudification” technology, potentially making it an offence to own tools designed to create non-consensual nude images.
• Create a new, independent regulatory body to conduct inspections on pornography sites and respond to complaints of illegal content.

The advocates contend that these measures would ensure the safeguards that have existed for decades offline finally apply to the online sphere.