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  • Porn provider fined £800,000 as 4chan refuses to comply with UK law – Tech Digest

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    A major pornography provider has been slapped with a massive fine for failing to protect children from adult content.

    Ofcom announced today that Kick Online Entertainment SA must pay £800,000 after it failed to implement mandatory age verification between July and December 2025.

    The penalty follows the introduction of the UK’s Online Safety Act, which made “highly effective” age checks a legal requirement as of July 25, 2025.

    According to the regulator, Kick Online Entertainment ignored these rules for five months, only bringing its sites into compliance at the end of the year.

    “Having highly effective age checks on adult sites to protect children from pornographic content is non-negotiable,” said Suzanne Cater, Ofcom’s Director of Enforcement. “Any company that fails to meet this duty – or engage with us – can expect to face robust enforcement action, including significant fines.”

    In addition to the main penalty, the company faces a £30,000 fine for failing to respond to Ofcom’s inquiries, alongside a recurring daily fine of £200. While Kick has since updated its systems, the regulator warned that it is currently investigating dozens of other sites.

    4chan refusing to comply

    The crackdown has sparked a high-stakes legal standoff with the controversial US-based message board 4chan. While Ofcom has issued a provisional notice indicating a likely £520,000 fine for age-check failures, 4chan’s legal team has stated the company has no intention of paying.

    The site’s lawyer, Preston Byrne, argued that 4chan has “broken no law in the only jurisdiction that matters – the United States.” He claimed that any attempt to enforce UK fines against the Delaware-incorporated company would violate the First Amendment, which protects free speech.

    If 4chan continues to refuse payment, Ofcom’s next steps could be more aggressive than a simple fine. Under the Online Safety Act, the regulator has the power to apply for court orders to block non-compliant sites in the UK entirely.

    This would force UK internet service providers to prevent users from accessing the platform. Ofcom can also seek “business disruption measures,” such as requiring payment processors and advertisers to stop working with the site.

    “We continue to investigate other sites under the UK’s age check rules and will take further action where necessary,” Cater added, signalling that the regulator is prepared for a long battle with offshore platforms.


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    Chris Price

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  • UK regulator fines 4chan for ignoring Online Safety Act demands

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    Ofcom has slapped 4chan with a £20,000 ($26,700) fine for failing to comply with the internet and telecommunications regulator’s request for information under the UK’s Online Safety Act of 2023. The regulator has released an update for 11 of the investigations it opened after the first of its online safety codes became enforceable in March this year. Apparently, 4chan has ignored its requests for a copy of its illegal harms risk assessment and to provide information about its qualifying worldwide revenue. This is the first fine Ofcom has handed down under the new law, which was designed to prevent children from accessing harmful content online and which has prompted websites like Reddit and X to put up age verification measures.

    When the regulator launch its probe into 4chan in June, it said it received complaints about illegal content on the anonymous online board. It doesn’t exactly come as a surprise that 4chan refuses to give the regulator information about the risks of illegal content on its website: Back in August, the service filed a lawsuit against Ofcom, arguing that the enforcement of the UK’s Online Safety Act violates Americans’ freedom of speech. “This fine is a clear warning to those who fail to remove illegal content or protect children from harmful material,” said Liz Kendall, the UK Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology. The regulator is also imposing an additional penalty of £100 ($133) per day on 4chan until it complies with its requests for information.

    Ofcom has announced the results of other investigations, as well, such as finding “serious compliance concerns” with two file-sharing services that have now deployed an automated tool that can detect and quickly remove uploads with child sexual abuse material (CSAM). Four other file-sharing services that were also under investigation for CSAM chose to geoblock access from UK IP addresses instead, so the regulator closed their cases.

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    Mariella Moon

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