The Canadian porn conglomerate Aylo, which owns pornographic sites such as Pornhub, RedTube, and YouPorn, has blocked access to its platforms in France.
The decision is a protest against a new French law that requires porn sites to implement age verification to protect minors from inappropriate and harmful content.
The so-called SREN law was passed in 2023 and gives sites until Saturday to implement a functioning age verification system. If the requirements are not met, the French media authority Arcom can decide to block access and impose fines.
Aylo announced that access to its platforms in France will be blocked starting today, Wednesday, and at the same time condemns the French government’s efforts.
“I can confirm that Aylo has made the difficult decision to suspend access to its user-uploaded platforms (Pornhub, YouPorn, RedTube) in France. We will be using our platforms to directly address the French public”, commented a spokesperson for Pornhub.

“Au revoir”
– It’s a matter of putting our values first, and that means communicating directly with the French people to tell them what their government is refusing to tell them, claimed Rabbi Solomon Friedman, partner at Ethical Capital Partners, which owns Aylo, in a brief press release on Tuesday.
He rejected the law, describing it as “ineffective”, “dangerous”, and “potentially privacy-infringing”, and referred to a message that Aylo’s platforms will display to French users starting Wednesday.
However, France’s Minister for Gender Equality, Aurore Bergé, took the porn giant’s complaints very lightly, responding to the announcement by writing “au revoir” (thank you and goodbye) on X, adding that “There will be less violent, degrading and humiliating content accessible to minors in France”.
“If Aylo would rather leave France than apply our laws, they are free to do so”, commented Clara Chappaz, France’s deputy minister for artificial intelligence and digital technology.
Protéger les mineurs, c’est notre engagement, notre responsabilité.
Pornhub, YouPorn et Redtube refusent de se conformer à notre cadre légal et décident de partir. Tant mieux !
Il y aura moins de contenus violents, dégradants, humiliants accessibles aux mineurs en France.— Aurore Bergé (@auroreberge) June 3, 2025
Investigating four sites
At the same time, EU regulators announced last week that they are investigating four major porn sites, including Pornhub, for suspected violations of EU rules on digital content. The rules require, among other things, that children be protected from pornographic material through effective age verification systems.
The European Commission also states that it has initiated formal proceedings against Pornhub, Stripchat, XNXX, and XVideos under the EU’s Digital Services Act.
Aylo has stated that it is aware of the investigation and claims that it is “fully committed” to ensuring the safety of children online.
Pornhub has been the subject of widespread criticism for several years. The site has been accused of allowing videos to be uploaded without sufficient checks on the age, identity or consent of the participants. Several people have testified that videos showing sexual abuse of them, sometimes when they were minors, were posted without their knowledge.
An investigation by The New York Times in 2020 found that the site hosted material that could be classified as child pornography. In the wake of the revelations, payment giants Visa and Mastercard chose to temporarily stop transactions to the platform. Pornhub has since introduced some changes, including restricting uploads to verified accounts and deleting millions of videos.
Much of the criticism remains, however, as many believe Pornhub still lacks sufficient transparency into how material is uploaded and distributed on the platform. In particular, critics point out that there are still no clear systems in place to ensure that all content is consensual and that minors do not appear in the material.