UK Adult Content Site Visits Declines After Age Checks, But VPN Use Surges, States Regulator

Traffic to pornography platforms in the UK has fallen significantly after the enforcement of age-checking measures earlier this year, according to the country's communications watchdog. Simultaneously, the adoption of tools designed to circumvent these barriers has risen.

Sharp Fall in Visitor Numbers After Rule Implementation

The introduction of age verification on 25 July resulted in an immediate fall in traffic to popular online adult platforms, such as the leading provider in the UK. Figures shows that user traffic to this platform in August reached 9.8 million, a decrease of 1.5 million compared to the same period in 2024.

In total, visitor numbers to the 10 top pornography sites in the UK have now settled at a markedly decreased volume than prior to the end-of-July implementation date. Later data suggests this decline in viewing persisted past August.

Surge in Virtual Private Network Adoption to Evade Restrictions

In response to the new rules, use of VPN software—which can circumvent geographic restrictions by routing internet traffic via another country—surged following 25 July.

User numbers reached a high at over 1.4 million in the middle of August, rising from approximately 650,000 people prior to the verification began. Subsequently, the regulator stated that VPN usage has since steadily declined, with latest figures standing at around 900,000. It added that the volume of regular VPN use is “much lower” than traffic for adult services.

Teenagers Responding to Damaging Material

In other findings, the regulator's annual study found that about 60% of teenagers aged 11 to 17 had taken action after encountering harmful content on the internet. Steps taken ranged from flagging the material to the site to blocking the user who shared it.

This research was conducted prior to new rules came into force that require platforms to stop children from seeing dangerous content, including material related to suicide and pornography. The primary way teenagers came across such content was by scrolling through a platform feed, indicating that recommendation systems were serving inappropriate material.

Ministers Launch Review of Adult Content Laws

Separately, the government announced it would review the legislation governing pornography to consider whether it is effective in the modern digital age.

“The review will investigate the efficacy of the existing law in relation to criminalising, among other things, damaging depictions of familial abuse and any types of pornography which promote child sexual abuse,” said a government official.

Advocates Push For Tighter Digital Regulations

Campaigners for tighter regulation of online pornography have called on the government to ban so-called “barely legal” material. This encompasses content featuring incest scenes or that appears to promote abuse by using youthful performers dressed as children.

Proposed amendments to legislation seek to:

• Ban pornography where performers are impersonating children, sometimes recorded in environments like children’s bedrooms.
• Broaden the crime of making an indecent image of a child to cover material where an older performer plays the role of a child.
• Introduce stricter regulation on familial abuse pornography, which research indicates is often promoted by site algorithms.
• Add further controls on “nudification” software, potentially making it an illegal act to possess tools designed to create private images without permission.
• Establish a new, separate oversight agency to perform inspections on adult platforms and act on reports of illegal content.

The campaigners contend that these steps would ensure the safeguards that have been enforced for decades in the physical world finally apply to the digital age.