UK porn site traffic has plummeted as the Online Safety Act’s age verification requirements come into full swing.

While first days of the act saw a surge in searches for VPNs, the world’s most popular porn sites are taking a major hit in UK viewership as Brits are reluctant to share their identity or credit card information to verify their age with the platforms under the new regime.

The Online Safety Act requires a number of sites that show content deemed harmful for children to verify user age. Porn sites will now have to ensure any user traffic coming from the UK is from users 18 and up.

Platforms can decide their own method of age verification, whether it be through credit cards, ID verification, or facial scanning. Still, many Brits are on the fence about sharing personal data with the sites.

Pornhub, the world’s most popular porn website, and other adult websites have seen their traffic decrease dramatically in the first week of August compared to the July average, data traffic experts Similarweb found.

Pornhub saw a 47% decrease in traffic between 24 July, a day before the new rules came into effect, and the 8th of August. XVideos, another porn site, was also down by 47%, and OnlyFans saw their traffic decrease by over 10%.

The data does show, however, that viewership of other smaller sites offering adult content, that are often less regulated, has increased.

Recommended

• Last Call for Online Age Checks as Deadline Looms
• VPN Sign-ups Surge As Ofcom Age Checks Come Into Effect
• Ofcom Cracks Down on Weak Age Verification

Further, many social media sites, including  X and Reddit, have also introduced age checks under the new rules, and did not see the same slump in traffic.

A Pornhub spokesperson said: “As we’ve seen in many jurisdictions around the world, there is often a drop in traffic for compliant sites and an increase in traffic for non-compliant sites.”

While many children’s advocacy groups are supportive of the law, it does leave many loopholes. Many are concerned that the law will encourage more people to use smaller, unregulated and underground sites to avoid age verification, either because they are underage or have privacy concerns. Others are concerned that the use of personal data for age verification is a serious security risk.

The rise of VPN downloads sparks fears that the legislation may be ineffective, or at least easily-evaded