After months of being porn-starved, at least through Pornhub and the rest of its digital skin-mag empire like YouPorn and Redtube, the renowned smut site is back up and running in the UK. Well, partially.
According to the BBC and a press release from Pornhub parent company Aylo, British users with updated Apple devices can once again access the company’s sites to… do whatever they do with them, thanks to Apple’s new device-level age verification system.
This is exactly what Aylo wanted all along.
Earlier this year, Aylo voluntarily shut its doors to new UK users after the country’s Online Safety Act started demanding stricter age checks for adult content. The company argued the law pushed websites toward clunky, invasive systems that required uploading IDs or selfies directly to porn platforms.
You know, the sort of thing that the company argued would leave its users open to ID theft and potential exploitation.
Pornhub Returns to UK iPhones Thanks to Device-Level Age Verification
Aylo spent months arguing for device-level verification, in which companies like Apple handle the age check before users even reach the website itself. With iOS 26.4, Apple rolled out a UK-only system that confirms whether users are over 18 through account history, payment information, or government-issued ID scans. Aylo immediately called it “the most effective and privacy-protecting” option available and reopened access to verified iPhone and iPad users.
The whole thing reveals just how messy age verification systems are and how, in the rush to implement them in the name of protecting children, they end up being so poorly implemented that they upset everyone on all sides. And that’s not to say we’re particularly good at what we do to begin with, as underage folks in both the UK and Australia (another nation where similar age-verification laws have been passed) have devised a series of low-tech yet creative ways to bypass age restrictions. Sometimes all they need is a simple VPN.
Ofcom, the UK regulator enforcing the law, says Aylo and company are in the online porn game are still primarily responsible for keeping kids off their services. Aylo has always agreed; they just disagreed on the method for restricting access. The company’s return to the UK is a major victory for it, as, again, device-level age verification is what it’s been arguing for all along.
Whether such a system makes its way stateside remains to be seen.
The post Pornhub Is Back in the UK, but Only If Your iPhone Says You’re Old Enough appeared first on VICE.
