Blogger about to quit and needs advice - Age verification

Webmaster Discussion
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#1

As a blogging promoter of adult websites I haven’t given much thought to all these age verification laws but now that the state I live in (Florida) has one going into effect on Jan 1 2025, all of a sudden this is on my radar and I’m not sure what to do. Most of my blogs have photos of nudity and explicit gay content and it looks like the law could fine me $50,000 for these! Yikes!

I’m seriously thinking of folding up shop, shutting down all my blogs and getting out of the adult business. It’s not like I’m making a huge amount of income on my blogs since affiliate sales have been going down for the past decade. I also can’t afford any of the age verification services and quite frankly I’d be amazed if any of my users actually used one to access my blogs.

Before I pull the plug I thought I’d ask here for advice. I read a suggestion about just changing all my content to G or PG rated, but if I’m still referring users to adult sites could I be held responsible for that? Any other ideas you’ve heard about regarding what bloggers are doing to adapt to this new age verification landscape?

#2

The issue is, its not just about the law in florida. You would need to comply with all other laws of the other states which introduced such laws.

As the Texas law is right now contested by the FSC, there is a chance that as soon as the US Supreme Court rules in that case, that the other laws will be contested too.

Now you have these options if you want to secure:

  • Age Verification
  • Block every US state which has such laws
  • Use only non porn pictures
  • Get out of biz.

Personally i would recommend you to block the US states with such laws.
You could use cloudflare WAF/Page Rules for that. And as you are in florida und still need to access, you could try to exempt your IP (if you have a stable IP). If you have a changing IP, it would be more complicated. Or you use yourself a VPN to access your own sites.