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Continue reading...Category Archives: Pornography
Giorgia Meloni ‘disgusted’ at posting of photos of her and other women on porn site
Italian platform Phica closes after sharing altered images of PM, her sister, opposition leader and others
The Italian prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, has said she is “disgusted” that photos of her and other women were posted on a pornographic website, and called for the perpetrators to be swiftly identified and “punished with the utmost firmness”.
Images of Meloni’s sister, Arianna, and the opposition leader, Elly Schlein, were also discovered on the Italian platform Phica, which had more than 700,000 subscribers before its managers closed the site on Thursday, blaming users for “using the platform incorrectly”.
Continue reading...Children’s exposure to porn higher than before 2023 Online Safety Act, poll finds
Children’s commissioner for England says findings show little had improved despite new law and tech firms’ promises
Exposure to pornography has increased since the introduction of UK rules to protect the public online, with children as young as six seeing it by accident, research by the children’s commissioner for England has found.
Dame Rachel de Souza said a survey found that more young people said they had been exposed to pornography before the age of 18 than in 2023, when the Online Safety Act became law.
More young people said they had seen porn before the age of 18 in 2025 (70%) compared with 2023 (64%).
More than a quarter (27%) said they had seen porn online by 11. The average age a child first sees pornography remained 13.
More vulnerable children had seen pornography earlier. Children who received free school meals, those with a social worker, those with special educational needs and those with disabilities – both physical and mental – were more likely to have seen online porn by 11 than their peers.
Nearly half of respondents (44%) agreed with the statement “Girls may say no at first but then can be persuaded to have sex”. Further analysis showed that 54% of girls and 41% of boys who had seen porn online agreed with the statement, compared with 46% of girls and 30% of boys who had not seen porn – indicating a link between porn exposure and attitudes.
More respondents said they had seen pornography online by accident (59%) than said they had deliberately sought it out (35%). The proportion of children accidentally seeing porn was 21 points higher than in 2023 (59% v 38%).
Networking and social media sites accounted for 80% of the main sources by which children accessed porn. X was the most common source of pornography for children, outstripping dedicated porn sites.
The gap between the number of children seeing pornography on X and those seeing it on dedicated porn sites has widened (45% v 35% in 2025, compared with 41% v 37% in 2023).
Most respondents had seen depictions of acts that are illegal under existing pornography laws or will become illegal through the crime and policing bill.
More than half (58%) had seen porn depicting strangulation, 44% reported having seen depictions of sex while asleep, and 36% had seen someone not consenting to or refusing a sex act, before they turned 18.
Further analysis found low numbers of children sought out violent or extreme content, meaning it was being served up to children, not that they were actively seeking it out.
Continue reading...UK pornography taskforce to propose banning ‘barely legal’ content after Channel 4 documentary airs
Programme about performer Bonnie Blue condemned for ‘glamorising and normalising’ extreme pornography
The new pornography taskforce will propose legislation this autumn aimed at banning a type of “barely legal” content produced by the porn star Bonnie Blue, the Guardian has learned.
The proposed action by the independent pornography taskforce, launched last month by the Conservative peer Baroness Gabby Bertin, comes in response to the broadcast of the Channel 4 documentary 1000 Men and Me: The Bonnie Blue Story. The programme followed the performer for six months and included her claim to have had sex with 1,057 clients over the course of 12 hours.
Continue reading...Anger grows in China over reports of online groups sharing explicit photos of women
Chinese media said more than 100,000 were members of Telegram group that shared pictures taken without consent
Anger is growing on Chinese social media after news reports revealed the existence of online groups, said to involve hundreds of thousands of Chinese men, which shared photographs of women, including sexually explicit ones, taken without their consent.
The Chinese newspaper Southern Metropolis Daily published a report last week about a group on the encrypted messaging app Telegram called “MaskPark tree hole forum”. It said it had more than 100,000 members and was “comprised entirely of Chinese men”.
Additional research by Lillian Yang and Jason Tzu Kuan Lu
Continue reading...Secondary schools in England to tackle ‘incel’ culture and teach positive role models
Government says new guidance will challenge ‘manosphere’ myths as DfE reports epidemic-scale misogyny
Secondary school pupils in England are to be taught about “incel” culture and the links between pornography and misogyny as part of long-awaited statutory government guidance due to be published on Tuesday.
It will include a new focus on positive role models for boys and challenge “myths about women and relationships that are spread online in the ‘manosphere’”, but will warn schools against “stigmatising boys for being boys”.
Continue reading...US supreme court rules in favor of age checks for pornography websites to keep children away
Court’s conservative justices said Texas law requiring online age verification didn’t violate free expression. PornHub had gone dark in Texas in protest of the law
The US supreme court ruled that a Texas law requiring that pornography websites verify the ages of their visitors was constitutional on Friday, the latest development in a global debate over how to prevent minors from accessing adult material online.
“HB 1181 simply requires adults to verify their age before they can access speech that is obscene to children,” Clarence Thomas wrote in the court’s 6-3 majority opinion. “The statute advances the state’s important interest in shielding children from sexually explicit content. And, it is appropriately tailored because it permits users to verify their ages through the established methods of providing government-issued identification and sharing transactional data.” Elena Kagan dissented alongside the court’s two other liberal justices.
Continue reading...UK study shows 8% of children aged eight to 14 have viewed online pornography
Ofcom says research shows need for stricter age checks being introduced in July, which most major sites have signed up to
Nearly one in 10 children aged eight to 14 have watched online pornography, according to the UK’s communications watchdog, as most adult content providers gear up to adopt stronger age checks ahead of a 25 July deadline.
Ofcom published research showing that 8% of children aged eight to 14 in the UK had visited an online pornography site or app over a month-long period. Boys aged 13 to 14 were the most likely viewers, with two out of 10 visiting adult sites.
Continue reading...Pornhub and other adult sites back online in France after three-week protest
Adult websites back online after court suspended decision requiring platforms based in the EU to verify users’ ages
Major adult websites Pornhub, YouPorn and RedTube were back online in France Friday after a court suspended a decision requiring pornographic platforms based in the European Union to verify users’ ages.
The three platforms’ owner, Aylo, based in Cyprus, had made its websites unavailable in France in early June as a protest against the French decree. Failure to comply could have lead to sanctions including fines or the blocking of the websites.
Continue reading...Gisèle Pelicot’s daughter says she believes online pornography played role in rape case
Caroline Darian tells Hay festival that pornography websites are ‘part of the system’ of misogyny and violence
There is “no way” that Gisèle Pelicot would have been raped more than 200 times without the existence of pornography websites, her daughter has said.
Speaking at the Hay festival in Powys on Thursday, Caroline Darian said there were “so many social problems like online porn” that can lead to instances of abuse.
Continue reading...Pornhub and three other adult websites face EU child safety investigation
European Commission alleges age verification systems are ineffective in preventing under-18s from watching
The EU executive has launched an investigation into four pornographic websites over alleged failure to prevent children from seeing adult content.
After analysis of company policies, the European Commission accused Pornhub, Stripchat, XNXX and XVideos of failing to have effective age verification measures to stop minors accessing their content.
Continue reading...Brazilian tribe sues New York Times for allegedly portraying members as porn addicts
Defamation suit claims Marubo people were depicted as tech-addled and porn-obsessed after introduction of internet
An Indigenous tribe from the Brazilian Amazon has sued the New York Times, saying the newspaper’s reporting on the tribe’s first exposure to the internet led to its members being widely portrayed as technology-addled and addicted to pornography.
The Marubo tribe of the remote Javari valley, a community of about 2,000 people, filed the defamation lawsuit seeking hundreds of millions of dollars in damages this week in a court in Los Angeles.
Continue reading...Social media platforms could face $50m fines if Australian children access adult content on their sites
Under proposed new codes submitted to eSafety commissioner, tech companies would have six months to implement new measures
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Social media and technology companies would have six months to implement a suite of new measures to restrict Australian children from accessing adult content online, or face fines up to $50m, under proposed new codes developed by the industry.
The draft codes, submitted to the eSafety commissioner last week for approval, would require social media platforms that allow pornography to prevent access to minors, and implement age assurance measures for users.
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Continue reading...‘Revenge porn’ abusers allowed to keep devices with explicit images
Prosecutors in England and Wales are failing to obtain orders requiring the deletion of intimate content shared without consent, analysis reveals
Perpetrators of “revenge porn” offences are being allowed to keep explicit images of their victims on their devices, after a failure by prosecutors to obtain orders requiring their deletion.
An Observer analysis of court records in intimate image abuse cases has found that orders for the offenders to give up their devices and delete photos and videos are rarely being made. Of 98 cases concluded in the magistrates courts in England and Wales in the past six months, just three resulted in a deprivation order.
Continue reading...Schools ‘need more help’ to tackle rising number of sexual assaults by pupils
Charities say better guidance is needed over increasing number of sexual assaults in UK primary schools
Schools must be given clearer guidance on how to handle peer-on-peer sexual abuse among pupils, charities have demanded.
Rape Crisis and other charities wrote to England’s education secretary Bridget Phillipson and Jess Phillips, the safeguarding minister, last week, calling on the government to step in with clearer statutory guidance on how schools in England and Wales should address sexual violence when both the victim and the alleged perpetrator are pupils.
Continue reading...Sydney teenager allegedly used AI to create deepfake pornography of students
Police are investigating after schoolboy allegedly circulated images of female students using fake social media accounts
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A teenage boy at a south-western Sydney high school has been reported to police after allegedly using artificial intelligence platforms to create pornography featuring other students.
The student is alleged to have created explicit deepfake images of female students and circulated them using fake social media accounts.
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Continue reading...Adult content sites without age checks may be blocked from Australian search results under draft code
Proposed industry code on age assurance for pornography and gambling content would come into force in 2025
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Sites hosting adult content could be removed from search results and blocked from linking on social media in Australia unless they verify the ages of users trying to access them, under a draft industry code released on Tuesday.
The age assurance for pornography and gambling content online precedes the development of the age assurance technology for teens accessing social media, but there will be crossover for sites such as X, which host adult content.
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Continue reading...Risk of serious injury as strangling during sex becomes normalised among young Australians
Sexual violence experts concerned about health risks and lack of consent after survey shows almost 60% of respondents under 35 had been choked at least once
Strangling a partner during sex is widely perceived as normal especially among young people, with more than half of adults aged 35 and under reporting they have been strangled, many of them unaware of potentially serious health consequences.
It is a finding that has sexual violence experts so concerned that they launched the “Breathless” campaign and website on Tuesday to highlight that strangulation – often referred to as “choking” – is unsafe, and often occurs with no or inadequate communication or consent.
Continue reading...Pornography and social media driving rise in labia surgery, Australian report finds
More than half a million people have had or considered having the procedure due to lack of education and diverse representation, survey shows
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Pornography and social media are driving a rise in people having or considering labia surgery, with images and videos distorting perceptions of what genitalia look like, a new report has found.
The surgery, known as labiaplasty, is one of the fastest growing cosmetic procedures among young people in Australia and worldwide.
Continue reading...Australian government pledges almost $1bn to help women leave violent relationships
‘Leaving violence payment’ of $5,000 will help women escape abusive relationships with money for services, risk assessments and safety planning
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Anthony Albanese has announced $925m to help victims of violence leave abusive relationships and a ban on deepfake pornography as new measures to combat violence against women.
After a national cabinet meeting on Wednesday, the prime minister announced the “leaving violence payment” of $5,000 to help meet the costs of leaving a relationship along with services, risk assessments and safety planning.
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