Digital services, EU puts porn giants in the crosshairs

Brussels – The ‘hot’ side of the internet is too ‘racy,’ and the European Commission battens down the  hatches putting porn sites in its crosshairs. Pornhub, XVideo, and Stripchat have been identified as Very Large Online Platforms (VLOPs) and, they must then comply with the Digital Services Act, the EU bill on the activities carried on-line. At the end of the assessment of the case in Brussels, the Commission has no doubt: the three websites have an audience of over 45 million users per month, and “any online platform with more than 45 million users in the EU has special obligations because of its size,” Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton said today.

Platforms with racy audio-video content, specific measures must empower and protect online users, including minors, and to duly assess and mitigate any systemic risks arising from their services. For minors, the Commission intimates the development of interfaces, recommender systems, and terms and conditions to address and prevent risks to children’s well-being. Mitigation measures are also needed to protect the rights of the child and prevent minors from accessing pornographic content online, including with age verification tools. Therefore, simply asking if you are at least 18 years old may not be enough. Pornhub, XVideo, and Stripchat have to assess the risks and detail any adverse effects on the protection of minors’ mental and physical health.

As for ‘searchable’ material, the three internet porn brands will have to be careful about what goes in the public domain. Intimate material uploaded without the consent of the person involved will have to be promptly removed and work will have to be done on an audio-visual product management system. The three sites will also have to strengthen their internal processes, resources, testing, documentation, and oversight of any activities related to systemic risk identification. In this sense, even comments to videos or chats should be subject to a code of conduct to respect the person’s dignity with mechanisms to remove less suitable comments.

There is also greater accountability and transparency. Pornhub, XVideo, and Stripchat must publish repositories of all ads posted on their interface. In addition, they will have to give access to publicly available data to researchers, including those selected and designated by the digital services coordinators. Users will have to be guaranteed the ability to report wrongdoing at any time. The new rules impose anti-revenge porn policies (the posting of amateur hard material against a person as payback for personal reasons), ‘deep fakes’ (photomontages), and child pornography.

In April, the Commission began to reshape the web market for greater accountability, data sharing, and countering harmful content, drawing up an initial list of major platforms that included 19 known names without touching the world of porn: until today.