Ofcom fines nudification site £50,000 for failing to introduce age-checks

Ofcom in the UK has today issued a £50,000 fine against the provider of a nudification site for failing to use age-checks to protect children from online pornography, while 20 more porn services are targeted for enforcement.

Robust age checks – which include age verification, age estimation or a combination of both – are a cornerstone of the Online Safety Act and must be ‘highly effective’ at correctly determining whether a particular user is a child. 

Regulated services are also required, by law, to respond to Ofcom’s requests for information in an accurate, complete and timely way, which is fundamental to our job as a regulator.

Earlier this year, Ofcom opened an enforcement programme to determine industry compliance with their age-check duties and, as part of this, issued statutory information requests to a range of companies. 

They are today announcing a number of updates under this enforcement programme:

Provider of nudification site fined 

An Ofcom investigation has today concluded that Itai Tech Ltd – which runs the nudification site Undress.cc – has failed to use highly effective age assurance to protect children from encountering pornographic content.

As a result, Ofcom has imposed a fine of £50,000 on Itai Tech Ltd, which takes into account  the provider’s decision to make the site unavailable to users with UK IP addresses shortly after Ofcom opened their investigation. An additional £5,000 penalty has been levied on the company on account of its failure to comply with a statutory information request. The fines will be passed on to HM Treasury.

In addition, Ofcom has also today issued two provisional decisions against 8579 LLC and Kick Online Entertainment S.A for similar failings. Both providers now have an opportunity to make representations to us before Ofcom make their final decisions.

Investigations opened into 20 more adult sites

Ofcom has today opened new investigations under its age assurance enforcement programme into five providers which together operate 20 pornography sites. The companies under investigation are: Sun Social Media Inc; the provider of various xxbrits sites; the provider of a number of porntrex sites; the provider of fapello.com; and the provider of hqporner.com.

Ofcom have prioritised action against these companies based on the risk of harm posed by the services they operate. They have taken particular account of their user numbers, including where they have seen significant increases in their user traffic since age-check laws came into force last summer. 

Separately, Ofcom are announcing an expansion to their ongoing investigations into Cyberitic, LLC and the provider of xgroovy.com to determine whether they have also failed to adequately respond to Ofcom’s formal requests for information. 

These new cases take the number of sites and apps currently under investigation by Ofcom under the Online Safey Act to 76. 

Suzanne Cater, Director of Enforcement at Ofcom, said: “The use of highly effective age assurance to protect children from harmful pornographic content is non-negotiable and we will accept no excuses for failure. Any service which fails to meet their age-check duties under the Online Safety Act can expect to face robust enforcement action, including significant fines.”