Pornhub Sues Texas Over Age Verification Law

Pornhub, along with several other members and activists in the adult industry are suing Texas to block the state’s impending law that would require age verification to view adult content. 

The complaint was filed on August 4 in US District Court for the Western District of Texas, and the law will take effect on September 1 unless the court agrees to block it. Governor Greg Abbott passed HB 1181 into law in June.

The plaintiffs, including Pornhub, adult industry advocacy group Free Speech Coalition, and several other site operators and industry members, claim that the law violates both the Constitution of the United States and the federal Communications Decency Act.

In the complaint, the plaintiffs write that the act employs “the least effective and yet also the most restrictive means of accomplishing Texas’ stated purpose of allegedly protecting minors,” and that minors can easily use VPNs or Tor; on-device content filtering would be a better method of restricting access to porn for children, they write. “But such far more effective and far less restrictive means don’t really matter to Texas, whose true aim is not to protect minors but to squelch constitutionally protected free speech that the State disfavors.” 

Under the law, porn sites would be required to display a “Texas Health and Human Services Warning” on their websites in 14-point font or larger font, in addition to age verification. 

“Texas could easily spread its ideological, anti-pornography message through public service announcements and the like without foisting its viewpoint upon others through mandated statements that are a mix of falsehoods, discredited pseudo-science, and baseless accusations,” the complaint says. 

In January, Louisiana enacted a law that requires website operators to implement age verification technology if their site consists of 33.3 percent or more material on a site that’s “harmful to minors.” The laws typically define content that’s harmful to minors as appealing to prurient interests, and that consists of “pubic hair, anus, vulva, genitals, or nipple of the female breast; Touching, caressing, or fondling of nipples, breasts, buttocks, anuses, or genitals; Sexual intercourse, masturbation, sodomy, bestiality, oral copulation; flagellation, excretory functions, exhibitions, or any other sexual act.” 

Six states have passed copycat laws since then. Pornhub has blocked anyone visiting from an IP address located in several of those states, including Utah and Virginia, where visitors are met with a plea from adult performer Cherie Deville to contact their representatives.