This new adult content ban is boosting VPN popularity

Sometimes I feel a bit like a broken record writing VPN news. Over the course of the last year, many countries around the world have started to enforce new laws around internet access that usually result in people having to upload their ID if they want to access content that has been deemed harmful to children, and it has happened once again.

Australia is the latest country to join that conga line, which isn't too surprising after last year's social media ban for under-16s. The conversation around the internet all seems to be focused on pornography, but the actual guidelines explain that this applies to "content that would be likely to be classified R 18+ or X 18+" - which explicitly includes movies and videogames as well.

Let me start by saying that, much like social media, young people's access to porn online is a genuine cause for concern. If somebody uses this content as their basis for sexual understanding, they're going to grow up with toxic and distorted views on reality. AI girlfriends are also explicitly identified in the guidelines as something that will be banned. As much as there are some who champion these as a solution to male loneliness, I think it's quite clear that having access to a totally subservient fake woman who does anything you want her to, and validates every opinion you have, is only going to throw your expectations of real women askew (and ultimately make someone lonelier, and more bitter).

I also think that the Australian guidelines are better than those in the UK. The UK had a great deal of ambiguity in the rules it laid down, which not only left room for genuinely helpful and educational content to be restricted but also seemed ripe for political hijacking. Comparatively, it's quite sensible for Australia to use the same guidance that is already in place for movies and other entertainment. After all, if you need ID to see a certain movie at the cinema, it makes sense that you'd need ID to access the same content online.

However, despite the fact that some good will come of this, I think it will still do more harm overall. All those adult Australians who want to keep accessing content online just as they always have will now have to start uploading proof of their ID - and where will this ID be stored? It'll be on a server somewhere just waiting to be hacked. We already saw it happen with Discord at the end of last year. Meanwhile, with AI learning algorithms absorbing data from just about everywhere, it's frightening to consider the amount of information that could be stolen about you - and then used to scam you or your loved ones.

Also, it just feels like an overstep. I'm not saying that people who like to consume adult content have anything to be ashamed of (assuming it's ethically produced), but that doesn't mean I think they should be fine with internet service providers, the government, and whoever else knowing the kind of stuff they like to watch. Especially when it'll probably all end up feeding into what social media algorithms and targeted ads end up showing them, to some extent.

Also, the restrictions do pose some risk for kids who want to get around them. An uninformed young person might just quickly search for a free VPN and end up using something that puts malware on their computer, or extracts every bit of data it can about them. They also might end up using similarly dodgy proxies.

The fact that "VPN" is currently being Googled in Australia more than it ever has been at any point in time previously shows us that this is the first instinct for a lot of people. Hopefully, people will turn to reliable sources like our list of the best VPN services, so they end up with something like NordVPN, Proton VPN, Surfshark, CyberGhost, and ExpressVPN, rather than something untrustworthy like JET VPN. If you do happen to go for one of these, we particularly recommend NordVPN, which came out top in our testing.