UK Poised to Pioneer Pornography Regulation with New Consent Laws
The United Kingdom stands at a pivotal moment in digital regulation, with the potential to become a global leader in online pornography oversight. The proposed crime and policing bill includes groundbreaking measures to enforce stronger consent verification for all participants featured in pornography, addressing long-standing failures in the industry.
The Urgent Need for Regulation
Once you pause to consider the evidence, the necessity for legislation ensuring participants have consented to appear in online pornography becomes undeniable. Documented failures have exposed systemic problems across the industry. The New York Times investigation into Pornhub revealed that one of the world's largest pornography platforms hosted videos featuring underaged and sex-trafficked individuals, leading to the removal of more than half its content. Meanwhile, the trial of Dominique Pelicot uncovered horrific abuses on the chat site Coco, where he shared multiple videos of his unconscious wife being raped in a chatroom titled "without her knowledge" before the platform's shutdown in 2024.
These egregious cases demonstrate that the permissive online environment should never have been tolerated. Ending this impunity through stronger regulation of both user-generated and commercially produced pornography was a central recommendation of Conservative peer Gabby Bertin's independent pornography review. The review specifically called for legislation requiring digital pornography businesses to verify the identities of all featured individuals and confirm their consent had been properly obtained.
The Current Regulatory Landscape
Few in British politics today would argue that online pornography has been adequately regulated. The absence of robust age verification until recently meant children and adults alike had unrestricted access to violent content, despite mounting evidence linking pornography to the normalization of dangerous acts like strangulation and choking. Last month, the National Crime Agency attributed the soaring rate of child sexual abuse in the UK to online image-sharing and chatrooms, noting that livestreams featuring children could be purchased for as little as £20.
While child sexual abuse imagery remains illegal, and pornography classified as "extreme" under specific definitions is prohibited, concerns about consent in professionally produced content persist. The UK's Online Safety Act introduced age verification for sites hosting user-generated content and empowered regulator Ofcom with fining and blocking authority. Last year, following courageous advocacy from survivors and women in parliament, the government outlawed creating and requesting deepfake pornographic images of real people.
The Path Forward
Labour MP Diana Johnson first proposed consent verification and a new right for performers to withdraw consent in parliament, with fellow Labour MP Jess Asato later reviving the effort. This month marks a significant breakthrough, as the House of Lords accepted an amendment to the crime and policing bill tabled by Gabby Bertin, giving the measure its strongest chance yet of becoming law.
Pressure from Bertin and her allies, including senior Labour figures, has already prompted ministers to agree to outlaw strangulation imagery and scenes purporting to depict incest. The government has also committed to closing the online/offline regulatory gap, where the British Board of Film Classification refuses to license DVDs featuring content "likely to encourage an interest in sexually abusive activity" or "acts likely to cause serious physical harm," while no equivalent rules exist for internet content.
The government now faces a decisive choice: accept the amended bill and establish the UK as a pioneer in online pornography regulation, or strip out the new clause. While acceptance appears more likely, it remains uncertain. Without support from influential peers like Beeban Kidron and Helena Kennedy, ministers might not have progressed this far. Notably, the government shows no indication of adopting Bertin's proposal for police to gather data on illegal pornography use to investigate potential links to other crimes, despite disturbing anecdotes like the discovery of violent pornography across Wayne Couzens's devices following his arrest for Sarah Everard's murder.
Historical Context and Contemporary Challenges
From the late 1970s, the women's liberation movement in the United States became deeply divided over pornography and the broader issue of commercialized sex. Fifty years later, legislation in this area remains challenging in the UK. Even with research indicating that 79% of children in England have viewed violent pornography and the harmful potential of eroticized sadism being increasingly clear, accusations of "moral panic" persist alongside arguments that sex education alone suffices.
Ideas about libido as a creative, liberating force have been intertwined with radical politics for centuries. This historical legacy, combined with a generally optimistic view of human nature, may contribute to some progressives' reluctance to embrace stricter regulation. Twenty-five years ago, novelist Martin Amis wrote about the trend toward violence in pornography, expressing anxiety that viewers might discover hidden perversities through increasingly extreme content.
Amis's concerns remain relevant today. Both viewers and performers face risks with pornography, particularly in an era of algorithms engineered to elicit the strongest possible responses. Society must protect individuals from such excesses while ensuring those who agree to be filmed during sexual acts retain the right to withdraw permission for others to watch. When the crime bill returns to the Commons, the government has an opportunity to champion a new, stronger model of consent that could set a global standard for digital safety and ethical media consumption.
