British Adult Content Traffic Declines Following Identity Checks, But Virtual Private Network Use Spikes, States Regulator

Access to pornography websites in the United Kingdom has seen a notable drop since the introduction of age-checking measures earlier this year, as reported by the country's communications watchdog. Concurrently, the usage of specialist software designed to bypass these barriers has surged.

Immediate Fall in Visitor Numbers After Rule Enforcement

The introduction of age verification on 25 July resulted in an immediate fall in traffic to leading online adult platforms, including the leading provider in the UK. Figures reveals 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, traffic to the 10 top pornography sites in the UK have now settled at a significantly reduced level than before the end-of-July implementation date. Later analysis shows this decline in site visits continued beyond August.

Sharp Increase in VPN Adoption to Bypass Restrictions

Reacting to the new rules, use of VPN software—which can circumvent geographic blocks by masking connections via another nation—surged after 25 July.

User numbers peaked at over 1.4 million in mid-August, up from around 650,000 people before the checks were introduced. However, the regulator noted that VPN usage has afterwards steadily declined, with current numbers at around 900,000. It clarified that the volume of daily VPN use remains “much lower” than traffic for adult sites.

Teenagers Responding to Harmful Material

Elsewhere, the watchdog's report found that about 60% of young people aged 11 to 17 had taken action after seeing harmful content online. Steps taken included reporting the content to the site to muting the person who shared it.

This research was carried out before new rules took effect that require platforms to stop children from accessing dangerous content, such as material related to suicide and adult material. The most common way teenagers encountered such content was by looking through a platform feed, suggesting that recommendation systems were serving inappropriate material.

Government Announce Review of Adult Content Laws

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

“The examination will investigate the effectiveness of the existing law in regarding criminalising, among other things, damaging depictions of incest and any types of pornography which promote the abuse of children,” stated a government official.

Advocates Call For Stricter Digital Regulations

Advocates for tighter control of adult content have called on the government to ban so-called “barely legal” material. This includes content featuring incest scenes or that encourages abuse by using young-looking performers portraying children.

Suggested changes to government bills aim to:

• Ban pornography where adults are mimicking children, sometimes recorded in settings like children’s bedrooms.
• Broaden the offence of making an exploitative portrayal of a child to include material where an older performer plays the role of a child.
• Introduce stricter regulation on familial abuse pornography, which research indicates is heavily recommended by platform systems.
• Introduce further restrictions on “nudification” technology, potentially making it an illegal act to possess tools designed to generate private images without permission.
• Establish a new, independent regulatory body to perform inspections on pornography sites and act on complaints of unlawful content.

The advocates argue that these steps would ensure the protections that have existed for decades offline finally are extended to the online sphere.