In their offensive against the big porn portals, media supervisors and youth protectionists can report their first success.

Judges in Düsseldorf agreed with them.

Several large porn portals in Germany are threatened with a network block in their current form because, according to a court order, they violate the protection of minors. The Düsseldorf Administrative Court announced on Wednesday that the State Agency for Media NRW (LfM) rightly objected to the freely accessible content of porn providers based in Cyprus and rightly prohibited its future distribution in this form in Germany. The decision was made in an urgent procedure, the main proceedings are still pending.

The state media agency announced that the court had fully confirmed their legal opinion.

The unambiguousness of the decision is "very gratifying".

A real age check of the users should be set up for the German offers.

Given the unambiguousness of the decision, it is difficult to imagine why the main proceedings should turn out differently.

Demand for effective age control

"In view of the decision, we ask the porn platforms to immediately guarantee the effective protection of children and adolescents," said LfM boss Tobias Schmid. “All they have to do is put in place effective age controls. Alternatively, you can also stop the distribution of the offer in Germany. ”The court rejected the urgent applications of the Cypriot companies against the requirements of the LfM on the protection of minors (Ref .: 27 L 1414/20, 27 L 1415/20, 27 L 1416/20 ). The German protection of minors in the media is applicable, even if the websites are operated from other EU countries.

The Düsseldorf judges found that the proceedings did not violate national constitutional law, international law or the law of the European Union.

The EU member state Cyprus was also sufficiently involved in the measures by the German authorities.

The providers could also not invoke the so-called country of origin principle, according to which only the rules of the country of origin apply to Internet providers.

The strict German protection of minors in the media must apply because children and adolescents face serious and grave dangers from free access to pornographic websites.

Studies have shown that around half of the children and adolescents surveyed have already consumed freely accessible pornography on the Internet.

Providers must ensure that only adults have access to such content.

A complaint can be lodged against a total of three resolutions, on which the Higher Administrative Court (OVG) for the State of North Rhine-Westphalia in Münster decides. A spokeswoman for the OVG said on request that the possibility of complaint had no suspensive effect.

The fact that children can also consume hard pornography online has long been a thorn in the side of media supervisors in Germany. Media supervisor and LfM boss Schmid wants to force the porn portals with the greatest reach to introduce effective age restrictions in their German-language offers. "If, on the one hand, we check every trailer on television, but confront children online with abnormal sexual practices unfiltered, then we can leave it alone." However, the porn giants in Cyprus have so far been able to rely on the lack of Cypriot interest in the enforcement of German youth protection. That is why the media supervisors want to use the infrastructure providers in Germany to ensure that illegal content is blocked.

There is good reason for the industry's lack of insight into the demands and appeals of the media watchdogs to date: Because porn consumption is still taboo, many users shy away from revealing their identity for an age check.

There is a risk of a massive drop in range.