It is news to nobody that the internet has enabled an unprecedented explosion of pornographic material. There is widespread awareness, too, that much of this is far more violent than used to be the norm in adult sexual publishing and entertainment – with more extreme content understood to drive engagement, as it does across the internet. The UK’s Online Safety Act should block children from accessing disturbing and unsuitable content. It is shameful that age-verification legislation took so long.
The independent report on pornography delivered to ministers this week ought to be the next step in a national effort to deal with the proliferation of online sexual violence. As Peter Kyle, the science secretary, said on Thursday, it is an authoritative piece of work. When he meets its author, Gabby Bertin, next week, he should commit to act on her recommendations. Draft guidance from Ofcom, regarding material currently defined as legal but harmful, is under consultation. But Lady Bertin is right to demand that ministers go further. While clear-sighted about the disproportionate harms to women, she notes, too, the dangers to boys and men, and highlights the prospect that problematic pornography use could be classed as an addiction.
The initial response from ministers suggests that making strangulation pornography illegal will, rightly given the associated risks, be prioritised. This is one of several areas in which the gap between the rules governing online and offline content is both wrong and illogical. Material that is illegal to distribute in physical form (in films or DVDs) ought to be prohibited online as well. It is shocking that payment processors such as Visa and Mastercard have, until now, been the closest thing there is to a regulator of the vast online pornography industry. The goal is not blanket censorship, but preventing harmful content from being produced, promoted and easily accessed, especially by minors.
Ministers’ reiteration of pledges to ban deepfake nude images and strengthen the law on intimate image abuse is also welcome. So is the acknowledgment that police tracking and recording of online sexual offences need to be improved, partly to increase understanding and evidence of links with “real life” violence. Even with the Online Safety Act in place, the current laws dating back to the Obscene Publications Act are inadequate and poorly enforced. Statutory codes as well as legislation could be used to close loopholes. The government’s commitment to halve violence against women and girls must point to a more robust overall approach. Measures to protect performers should include a new right to withdraw consent – meaning that pornographic content would be taken down.
The existence of pornography categories including incest, step-incest and “teens”, points to dark aspects of sexuality that many people would rather ignore – and partly explains the extraordinary laxness with which the industry is treated. The safety by design measures in the Online Safety Act must be used to compel businesses to stop promoting material that is harmful but not illegal.
Regulation of the sex industry is an international issue as well as a domestic one. But Lady Bertin directs her challenge to the home secretary, Yvette Cooper, in particular. For too long, she argues, pornography policy has been dispersed across government, leaving no one fully in charge. The review makes a powerful case that Ms Cooper should take it on.
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