
Age verification becomes mandatory on porn sites in the UK, and gradually in France
The United Kingdom made headlines last month by announcing that, starting July 25, several major porn sites would deploy age verification tools in the UK, retiring the familiar and purely declarative button, "I am over 18." Among these are several websites – Pornhub, RedTube, YouPorn, Tube8 and MyDirtyHobby – run by Aylo, a leading Canadian and Cypriot group in the industry. The list also includes "camshow" platforms, such as ICF Group (Streamate, LiveHDCams), Cam4 and Cypriot giant Stripchat.
Adult video sites are not the only ones complying with the measures set out in the Online Safety Act, passed in 2023. In recent weeks, a range of publishers have announced plans to deploy age verification tools in the UK, starting with Reddit, the American social media platform, which will hide its pornographic content behind a filter designed to keep minors out. The same goes for the gay dating app Grindr and even the social network Bluesky.

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France 24
2 hours ago
- France 24
Meta to ban political ads in EU due to bloc's 'unworkable' rules
The EU has a bolstered legal armoury to rein in Big Tech, against which Meta has hit out with the support of the US administration under President Donald Trump. "This is a difficult decision -- one we've taken in response to the EU's incoming Transparency and Targeting of Political Advertising (TTPA) regulation," the company said. Political, electoral and social issue advertising will no longer be allowed from October in the bloc, it said, because of "unworkable requirements" under the new rules. "Unfortunately, the TTPA introduces significant, additional obligations to our processes and systems that create an untenable level of complexity and legal uncertainty for advertisers and platforms operating in the EU," Meta added. The EU says its political advertising rules seek to increase transparency in online advertising after Facebook's Cambridge Analytica scandal, which came to light in 2018. Cambridge Analytica was a consulting firm that was found to have improperly accessed personal data from millions of Facebook users for targeted political advertising, particularly during the 2016 US election and Brexit referendum. The change is set to impact Meta's flagship platforms Facebook and Instagram, as well as WhatsApp -- which is largely ad-free but announced in June it would be introducing new advertising features in some parts of the app. Meta said it was "not the only company to have been forced into this position". Google last year announced it would also prevent political advertising in the EU from October 2025 because of the "significant new operational challenges and legal uncertainties". Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been highly critical of European rules, accusing Brussels in January of "censorship" and equating EU fines against the company to tariffs. The latest row between Meta and the EU has been over the firm's "pay or consent" system. The EU imposed a 200-million-euro ($235-million) fine in April after concluding Meta violated rules on the use of personal data on Facebook and Instagram. The company faces additional daily penalties if it does not make changes, with Brussels yet to decide whether Meta has modified the platforms enough to avoid more fines.


Euronews
2 hours ago
- Euronews
Hammered by US tariffs, Volkswagen's profit drops sharply
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LeMonde
3 hours ago
- LeMonde
LVMH, caught in turmoil, says it will expand its production in the US
Bernard Arnault has pledged allegiance to Donald Trump – again. Amid an ongoing standoff between the US and Europe over the introduction of new tariffs, the founder and CEO of LVMH announced on Thursday, July 24, his intention to expand Louis Vuitton's production capacities across the Atlantic. The largest brand of the French luxury group is considering opening a second factory in Texas, a state where it already operates a leather goods workshop that was inaugurated in the presence of the US president in 2019 during his first term. This would bring the total number of Louis Vuitton factories in the country to four. "For our American customers, buying a Louis Vuitton product made in the US is absolutely no problem," Arnault argued in an interview with the French daily Le Figaro on Thursday, the same day the Wall Street Journal also published an interview with the French billionaire that, among other topics, focused on this project. The workshop will not open its doors until 2027. However, the announcement is sure to make waves on both sides of the Atlantic, as Washington recently secured major Japanese investments in the US on July 22, in exchange for a 15% tariff rate instead of the initially announced 25%.