Yes, the government has the ability to restrict our ability to see porn online. But would it ever dare to?

The Conservative party in the UK promised, if elected, to force age verification on porn sites. Dr Gilad Rosner, visiting researcher at Horizon, has written a piece for the New Statesman discussing if they would ever dare to institute this.

The article proposes that the age verification system needed is possible and discusses various models for this to work – but are we happy to let identity providers know what we’re looking at online? Dr Rosner states: “A key issue is that using a third party for online access means that someone is always looking over your shoulder. Since the content in this case is porn, people are going to be very sensitive about revealing their online habits and preferences”

The full article makes very interesting reading, and was followed up by BBC Technology, the Today Programme on BBC Radio 4 (interview begins at 00:50:10) and Buzzfeed.

Gilad Rosner, who graduated with a PhD from the Horizon Centre for Doctoral Training in 2014, is researcher and consultant in the fields of privacy and identity management, and the founder of the Internet of Things Privacy Forum. He is also on the Cabinet Office Privacy & Consumer Advocacy Group.