When the Paris Court of Appeal recently blocked four porn sites in France for not having a proper age verification system, the two online child protection nonprofits that had pushed for the blocks probably thought they’d scored a big victory. But in one case, it turned out to be a bit of a self-own.
As l’Informé reports, the nonprofits went after Iciporno, Mrsexe, Tukif, and xHamster. Their complaints listed the web addresses of the sites, but for xHamster they put “fr.xhamster.com,” pointing to the site’s French subdomain.
As a result, the court ordered the blocking of “fr.xhamster.com,” including the “fr.” prefix. This means internet service providers have complied with the order and blocked xHamster at the DNS level but only with the “fr.” prefix. So xHamster remains accessible in France—until the regulator, or the courts, decide to extend the ban to the main domain or other subdomains. This situation has sparked ongoing debates about internet censorship and the challenges of enforcing such regulations in an increasingly global digital landscape.
Arcom finds a way to close this embarrassing loophole.
