Why porn has put Rishi Sunak in a tight spot with his own party

Rishi Sunak just can’t catch a break.

The UK prime minister, who has had to face a series of controversies, is feeling the heat again – this time over porn age verification.

Sunak is in the line of fire from members of his own Conservative Party – who are seeking to require websites to have in place “thorough age checks” to stop youths from watching pornography.

“What we need is an emphatic timetable and clear-cut commitment to hard-gated mandatory age verification,” James Bethell, a Conservative peer overseeing the amendments, told Bloomberg.

“The current provisions are a kumbaya aspiration that leaves open too many loopholes, no enforcement and no timetable,” he added.

So what’s the issue? Let’s take a closer look:

As per India Today, the Online Safety Bill has been formulated to safeguard children who are surfing the web.

Introduced in March under former prime minister Boris Johnson, it is slated to begin its passage through the House of Lords on Monday.

It has the backing of party bigwigs such as Priti Patel and Ian Duncan Smith, as per the report.

As per Bloomberg, the online safety bill is proposing that

• All porn websites within six months implement age verification systems
• Make users prove they are above age 18 through stringent forms used for gambling
• To do so through a third-party tool to protect privacy

As per Metro UK, top bosses in Britain failing to protect children from online harm could face time in jail.

The bill was originally crafted to regulate platforms such as Facebook , Instagram, TikTok and YouTube. The aim was to remove harmful content such as revenge porn and encouraging suicide.

However, in November the mandate to remove ‘legal but harmful’ content was deleted after the government warned it could impact free speech.

Metro UK quoted industry body techUK as saying such a bill threatening executives with prison time would not protect children and even damage the country’s digital economy.

‘The bill as drafted does have “teeth” that will ensure compliance,’ it said in a statement.

It added that the amendment created ‘significant legal jeopardy for firms’ and would thus make Britain less attractive to investors.

Facing the prospect of defeat, Sunak’s government under pressure from some its own backbenches — as well as calls from online child safety campaigners — to include expanded criminal liability provisions by making senior management at in-scope platforms criminally liable for repeat breaches of child safety duties.

Other approaches to age verification, including using software that estimates someone’s age by analysing their face via a webcam or phone camera, do not require any identity documents, as per Bloomberg.

The UK government previously attempted to introduce age verification through the Digital Economy Act of 2017 bill, but such amendments were dropped before being implemented.

With inputs from agencies

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