Age Verification will fail because of Peer to Peer porn.

Why Age Verification is doomed to failure.

We all want to protect under 18s from adult material but the ideals of age verification are doomed to failure for a number of reasons.

This legislation is aimed at protecting the most technologically aware group of people out there in society -  those mostly under 18 who have greater access to computers and who are being taught how to code -  if they know how to code, they can build their own apps and bypass the mainstream checks or use virtual private networks to do so. 

Even if Google closes references to 'adult material' sites, the under 18s will just get their adult material from elsewhere. Has no one thought of this?

This 'underground' situation will likely take place through apps, via Peer to Peer transmission, or by physical transfer through sharing on SD Data cards. 

The result is it won't stop the problem of under 18's getting hold of, distributing or holding adult material, it merely drives it underground and drives them potentially into harms way, the very opposite of what was intended by this bill.

Those under 18 often have little or no appreciation of what they are doing is wrong or unlawful, to them it is just something that they just 'do', without fully appreciating the consequences or implications of the material.

We are now seeing the under 18s using and distributing adult material on an industrial scale due to the rise in smart phone, tablet and lap top use, devices which are almost 'necessity must haves' for people nowadays.

Much as in the old days of sharing porno mags between your mates at school, now it is peer to peer sharing literally of data and material between devices. Like the old days, pretty much unstoppable.

The Age Verification system will be a dangerous thing for law abiding adults who may want to enjoy pornography for their own pleasure, their personal data and lawful adult interests could well be open to data collection and potentially useable as 'history' in legal cases unless this data is secure and not for third party disclosure.

We have seen many disgruntled employee data thefts and sensitive information about an adult's personal and private interests, especially if you are a celebrity for example, could provide organised criminals with means of coercion for financial gain. Or as we used to call it, blackmail. 

We may yet see our first suicide due to coercion from held adult material related data that has been stolen or sold on from any implied threats to expose or publish the information, blackmail and demands for money that the victim cannot meet or refuses too. 

Clearly this legislation situation needs a rethink. This legislation was formulated for the right reasons to protect under 18's, but is bad in that it could open up people's data history to unscrupulous exposure, an eventuality which cannot be ruled out by the data holder. 

Any savvy kid is going to get hold of a legitimate verification code and it will be passed on and on. So, the scheme fails there.

It does not stop the peer to peer transmission that is the norm now, so we read in the media.

Age verification may potentially expand to any UK website and that could be bad news if you say want to go onto Amazon's UK site to buy some H B pencils, but have to prove your age because that site carries age restricted products available to 18+ only. 

The age verification legislation appears to be badly thought out and unworkable, it will cause more problems than it likely solves.