As the UK rushes towards its block on porn for the under-18s there have been calls to treat adult entertainment much like a public health crisis, the Telegraph reports. The government's Women and Equalities committee. The idea is to shift the public perception of porn and make it socially unacceptable, in the same way smoking is seen now.
There have also been calls to ban the viewing of porn on public transport. Yes, that's right, people watching shagging vids on the bus is enough of a problem to warrant an actual ban, apparently. Although the idea comes from a broadly good place - the hope of safeguarding women and reducing sexal assult.
And of course, anyone watching porn in public would be creating a toxic environment around them, particularly for women. Most men would probably not enjoy the sight of someone settling down on a train to stare at grot either.
The legislation would ask for porn services to be banned on train Wi-Fi and customers would also be prohibited from using their own connection. The same would apply to anyone using a VPN too, presumably.
These proposed bans follow on from the plan to block access to adult sites for anyone under the age of 18. Intended to be a requirement from next year the block will require that everyone prove they are old enough using one of the government's approved age-checking vendors.
Privacy activists are concerned however that a database of porn viewers would be created and the potential for leaks and hacks that reveal people's desire to watch porn would be revealed. While companies offering the services, Like AgeID, claim the data won't log either porn habits or personally identifying information, the risks are considerable.
Of course age checks are redundant if people use VPNs to appear as if they're located in other countries.
