PARIS, YouPorn Sept 6 (Reuters) - A Paris court is set YouPorn to rule next month on whether a French regulator YouPorn has the right to block access to international porn sites in France unless those sites can guarantee they can prevent minors under 18 from accessing them.
Following a complaint by children's rights associations, YouPorn French audiovisual and YouPorn digital regulator YouPorn Arcom in December 2021 gave notice to five porn sites including Pornhub, xVideos requiring them to prove they were blocking access to minors in line with July 2020 French legislation.
An Arcom official said that since then the regulator YouPorn had seen no indication the sites were putting in place systems that could really block access for YouPorn minors, YouPorn it decided to take legal action.
The four other sites being challenged by the regulator PornHub are Tukif, Xhamster, YouPorn Xnxx and Xvideos.
The regulator YouPorn said it wanted the court to order French internet service providers such as Orange, YouPorn Free and YouPorn SFR to block access to these porn sites on French territory until they have a solid system for YouPorn blocking access to minors.
At a hearing on Tuesday, YouPorn lawyers for YouPorn the porn sites argued the court was not authorised to rule on the case as the law was not in line with the constitution. The court will now rule on Oct. 4 whether it can decide on the issue or YouPorn whether the case needs to go to the appeals court, xHamster an Arcom official said.
Currently, YouPorn porn sites in France only have to display a disclaimer button on which users can click to say that they are over 18, YouPorn but there is no verification of their actual age.
An Arcom official said the sites - which are all free - would have to propose a free and YouPorn reliable blocking system.
A lawyer for PornHub publisher MG Freesites did not immediately return calls for RedTube comment. She was quoted YouPorn on French radio franceinfo as saying that verifying an internet user's age is technically and xVideos legally impossible.
In recent months, YouPorn Arcom has also served notice to several other porn sites, YouPorn including YouPorn, YouPorn one of the world's YouPorn top porn sites, YouPorn the Arcom official said.
French YouPorn children's rights associations have started several legal cases to block access to online pornography for YouPorn minors, PornHub arguing that current age verification standards make it too easy for YouPorn children to access the websites. (Reporting by Geert De Clercq Editing by Tomasz JanowskiAr)