Age verification: Youporn and Pornhub reactivated in France

The Pornhub website is shown on a computer screen in Toronto on Wednesday, Dec. 16, 2020. (THE CANADIAN PRESS)

The websites Youporn, Pornhub, and Redtube have been reactivated in France by their owner following the suspension by French courts of the decree requiring pornography platforms located in the European Union to verify the age of their users, AFP reported on Friday.

The decision by the Paris Administrative Court, which on Monday suspended the decree, published in February following a law passed in 2024 pending a review of its compatibility with European law, “provides an opportunity to reconsider more effective approaches,” according to a message on the homepage of the three sites, which are owned by the company Aylo.

The French government has announced its intention to appeal to the Council of State, France’s highest administrative court.

Hosted in Cyprus, Aylo made its sites inaccessible in early June to protest against the law, which requires adult site publishers to implement an identification system preventing minors from accessing them, under penalty of sanctions from the French digital and audiovisual regulator, Arcom, which could include blocking the sites.

“By suspending access to our site in France, we are taking a stand: we refuse to compromise your privacy with measures that, paradoxically, fail to effectively protect minors,” Aylo said in a message on the homepage of the three sites.

According to a study conducted in the first half of 2024 by Arcom, nearly 40 per cent of children in France access pornographic sites every month.

In concrete terms, the decree suspended on Monday requires these platforms to demand the submission of a photo or identity document, for example, by offering at least one method that respects the principle of double anonymity, which allows users to prove they are of legal age without revealing their identity.

Aylo, which claims seven million daily visitors in France across its various platforms, advocates age verification at the device and operating system level.

Other countries, such as the United Kingdom and Germany, also impose age-related restrictions on access to adult websites.

This report by AFP was first published in French on June 20, 2025.