4chan and Kiwi Farms Sue the UK Over Its Age Verification Law (404media.co)
- Reference: 0178898050
- News link: https://yro.slashdot.org/story/25/08/27/205230/4chan-and-kiwi-farms-sue-the-uk-over-its-age-verification-law
- Source link: https://www.404media.co/4chan-and-kiwi-farms-sue-the-uk-over-its-age-verification-law/
> 4chan and Kiwi Farms sued the United Kingdom's Office of Communications (Ofcom) over its age verification law in U.S. federal court Wednesday, fulfilling a promise it [1]announced on August 23. In the lawsuit, 4chan and Kiwi Farms claim that threats and fines they have received from Ofcom " [2]constitute foreign judgments that would restrict speech under U.S. law ." Both entities say in the lawsuit that they are wholly based in the U.S. and that they do not have any operations in the United Kingdom and are therefore not subject to local laws. Ofcom's attempts to fine and block 4chan and Kiwi Farms, and the lawsuit against Ofcom, highlight the messiness involved with trying to restrict access to specific websites or to force companies to comply with age verification laws.
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> The [3]lawsuit calls Ofcom an "industry-funded global censorship bureau." "Ofcom's ambitions are to regulate Internet communications for the entire world, regardless of where these websites are based or whether they have any connection to the UK," the lawsuit states. "On its website, Ofcom states that 'over 100,000 online services are likely to be in scope of the Online Safety Act -- from the largest social media platforms to the smallest community forum.'" [...] Ofcom began investigating 4chan over alleged violations of the Online Safety Act in June. On August 13, it announced a provisional decision and stated that 4chan had "contravened its duties" and then began to charge the site a penalty of [roughly $26,000] a day. Kiwi Farms has also been threatened with fines, the lawsuit states.
"American citizens do not surrender our constitutional rights just because Ofcom sends us an e-mail. In the face of these foreign demands, our clients have bravely chosen to assert their constitutional rights," said Preston Byrne, one of the lawyers representing 4chan and Kiwi Farms.
"We are aware of the lawsuit," an Ofcom spokesperson told 404 Media. "Under the Online Safety Act, any service that has links with the UK now has duties to protect UK users, no matter where in the world it is based. The Act does not, however, require them to protect users based anywhere else in the world."
[1] https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/08/22/2029253/4chan-refuses-to-pay-uk-online-safety-act-fines
[2] https://www.404media.co/4chan-and-kiwi-farms-sue-the-uk-over-its-age-verification-law/
[3] https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26076733-govuscourtsdcd28421810-1/?ref=404media.co
The US (Score:3)
bullies foreign companies in the same exact way.
Re: (Score:3)
> bullies foreign companies in the same exact way.
We're definitely not any better, as the whole TikTok saga demonstrates. Though, TikTok does have a US presence and since it's accessed by Americans primarily via its mobile app, that necessitates having business relationships with our domestic smartphone duopolies.
If TikTok was just a website run entirely out of China, the US government would basically have to take a page out of China's own playbook and block it with our own "great firewall".
Re: (Score:2)
TikTok isn't going anywhere. The Whitehouse now has an official account. [1]https://www.reuters.com/world/... [reuters.com]
[1] https://www.reuters.com/world/us/white-house-launches-tiktok-account-with-trump-saying-i-am-your-voice-2025-08-19/
Re: The US (Score:2)
The USA has long held that if any US citizen is involved, or even if mails cross a US server, the US has jurisdiction.
How does it feel if the shoe is on the other foot?
I'm a little confused about this (Score:2)
If these sites are wholly US based, couldn't the operators just throw the fines into the garbage? Hate to say it, but China's already figured this one out - if you don't trust your citizens to venture out onto the global internet, you put up a firewall. The rest of the world has no obligation to follow the UK's (or anyone else's) laws.
Re: (Score:3)
> The rest of the world has no obligation to follow the UK's (or anyone else's) laws.
No but they still want to earn money based on page views from the UK (and others). So these companies usually compromise. They mainly want to make money, not win a point.
Re: (Score:1, Troll)
> No but they still want to earn money based on page views from the UK (and others).
4chan is an anonymous shitposting forum, and Kiwi Farms is most accurately described as a far-right cesspool of hate speech. They're both textbook examples of the 1A being stretched to the absolute limit of its interpretation. I doubt very many sponsors want to be associated with either of the sites, so money based on page views probably isn't a huge factor here.
Re: (Score:2, Troll)
It's more of the UK trying to implement political censorship at a global level. The EU has similar ambitions. The Biden Administration was trying it in the US as well. While you very well don't agree with the content on these sites, they are actually fighting for your rights as well as their own in this matter.
Re: (Score:2)
You might want to call it political censorship if you want but it certainly isn't "at a global level". They only define conditions for viewers from the UK.
It is at a global level (Score:2)
It forces non-UK services available to worldwide audiences to either discriminate between users by nationality or alternatively, to self-censor content with the threat of a fine or a criminal conviction for website operators if they do not comply. That is trying to influence how people run their websites on a global level, no matter how Ofcom tries to spin things, and the idea that any changes made only affect British users is bunk.
If you as a website operator are now processing geolocation information t
Re: (Score:2)
> It forces non-UK services available to worldwide audiences to either discriminate between users by nationality
It only forces them to follow UK law if they intend to show contents to UK users. They could easily geoblock the UK, and geoblocking is a normal thing to do nowadays when local regulations are unpleasant to them e.g. GDPR.
Re: I'm a little confused about this (Score:2)
And nobody will miss them as nothing of value will be lost.
The idea that unfettered free speech is somehow a good idea is very specific to the USA, and demonstrably a stupid idea in a lot of cases. Even the USA has had to restrict speech. But they haven't had a genocidal war yet, so I presume they really have no clue.
Re: (Score:2)
The problem is on the implementation side.
It is very hard to create a system that can effectively control speech without turning it into a dystopia, specially when half of the people making the system want to turn it into a dystopia because they want their personal opinions enforced.
It took 1 day to the "kids protection program" from UK to turn into a political dissent blocking tool.
Re: (Score:2)
KF is worse than that. They actively promote domestic terrorism.
Sites like KF (LC is another one) only exist because their hosting is in fact, NOT in the US. They're usually hosted somewhere that has no US law reach because they know while they might slide under the 1A, what they post is incitement to violence and defamation which is not protected speech. The sites continue to exist the same reason why your typical piracy torrent site still exists. It's far more likely that law enforcement is actually on th
Re: (Score:3)
> No but they still want to earn money based on page views from the UK (and others).
These sites earn no money in the UK have no UK customers, no UK registered business interests. Even with localised UK adverts the actual business dealings are retained in the USA. 4chan is not some multinational.
Re: (Score:2)
Then you travel into the UK, and whoops. Or you have a plane layover in Ol' Blighty. Or there's a storm at your destination airport and your plane gets rerouted.
Re: (Score:2)
> Then you travel into the UK, and whoops.
Considering the content those sites host, the site operators probably shouldn't be visiting any country which lacks really strong free speech protections.
Re: (Score:3)
> If these sites are wholly US based, couldn't the operators just throw the fines into the garbage?
They can, but how does that raise awareness of the issue? The point here is symbolic and to get media attention. The point here is to start a propaganda fight in the hope that the UK doesn't just put a great firewall up and block the sites.
Re: (Score:2)
> The point here is to start a propaganda fight in the hope that the UK doesn't just put a great firewall up and block the sites.
We're kind of heading in that direction anyway. Even without the great firewall , when the site itself decides to do their own blocking it's effectively the same thing. Examples:
Redgifs: Dear User,
As you may know, your elected officials in florida are requiring us to verify your age before allowing you access to our website ...
Pornhub: Dear user,
As you may know, your elected officials in Florida are requiring us to verify your age before allowing you access to our website ...
Eastboys: (just FYI to anyone
Re: (Score:2)
> You're not missing much. Those eastern European guys just lie there hissing at each other.
I think you mean it's more like a hollow victory, since it isn't requiring the usual age verification. Seriously though, as near as I can tell it's a typical paid adult site where they have the most boring 15-second previews available to watch for free, and everything else requires a credit card (which more-or-less should satisfy an age check requirement law anyway).
For the time being, discussion forums and social media are still exempt from age checks, so there's plenty of porn on Reddit and X. But I'm s
4 way tug of war (Score:2)
Team 1: The UK internet users
Team 2: Ofcom (UK FCC equivalent) and the UK Parliament
Team 3: The service providers 4Chan and Kiwi
Team 4: Trump's Tariffs
Possible outcomes:
1. The UK government and Ofcom relent
2. The UK erects a "Great UK firewall"
3. The service providers decide not to serve UK residents.
4. Trump imposes crushing tariffs on the UK because of this
Re: (Score:1)
I'm putting my bets on 2 or 3. 4 is also a possiblity, with or without 2 or 3.
1 won't happen merely because of a lawsuit, but it might happen if Trump decides to put eleventy-billion-percent tarrifs on the UK in response.
Register a complaint (Score:2, Troll)
I see Ofcom has a form for submitting complaints.
[1]https://www.ofcom.org.uk/make-... [ofcom.org.uk]
You know what to do and how to do it!
[1] https://www.ofcom.org.uk/make-a-complaint
Kiwi farms kaput? (Score:2)
I'd never heard of Kiwi Farms, but it appears as if Cloudflare have.
[1]https://www.couriermail.com.au... [couriermail.com.au]
[1] https://www.couriermail.com.au/technology/online/inside-kiwi-farms-the-hatefilled-platform-that-just-had-its-worst-day-ever/news-story/a6974fabccb676533b13dbfc038b5810
Is it possible (Score:2)
for everyone in this case to lose? Like both the plaintiff and the defense?
So, let me get this straight... (Score:2)
4chan is a US company that has been delivering services to people in the UK and getting revenue from that traffic. UK law says that if you deliver service in the UK and meet certain criteria then you need to verify the users' age. They didn't comply, and the UK said "If you continue to deliver services into the UK that don't comply with the law then we will sanction you with both fines and blocking your traffic." They said "Screw you" to the regulator. Now when Ofcom asks UK ISPs to block their traffic, Ofc
So kiwi farms cannot survive a law like this (Score:2)
They specialize in two things. Doxing gay and trans people and trying to encourage them to commit suicide. So it's absolutely not going to fly having a kiwi farms user hand out their actual identity.
This is one of those cases where the worst sort of person is doing something that needs to be done. But for kiwi farms I have genuine mixed emotions because they are hiding behind anonymity to commit actual crimes.
I suppose it's possible they cleaned up their act a little bit because they were taken offl
Re: (Score:2)
> This is one of those cases where the worst sort of person is doing something that needs to be done.
Not really. We didn't need the internet's clown car and septic tank to save us from UK age checks. The SCOTUS already said our domestic ones are perfectly legal, so they're coming, like it or not. This is more a case of the US government getting an opportunity to say "You don't get to abuse the rights of our citizens, that's our job!"
> I suppose it's possible they cleaned up their act a little bit because they were taken offline when even the cdns who run the white supremacists wouldn't touch them because of the legal liability.
I doubt it. Even if you pump out a septic tank, soon enough it fills right back up with shit. Seems someone claiming to represent Kiwi Farms has an account on X (Keepin'
\o/ (Score:1)
I don't see why being from the UK should mean that we're subject to the whims of these people who have decided they're in charge simply because they have a monopoly on tools of coercive force.
UK citizens have as much influence over the rules the UK establishment try to use to coerce us as US citizens - zero.
Sued in a US court (Score:2)
Surely if the same principle applies - why would Ofcom care what a US court decides?
Re: (Score:2)
Because ignoring US courts means that fines won't be effective. It would make it far more difficult for the UK to enforce an fines, leans, or freezes through US banks if there is a favorable US judgement. The process for enforcing fines is so incredibly complicated that you basically need a dedicated legal team to deal with fighting them, it's usually easier to pay the fine once then comply.
Re: (Score:2)
First, yeah.
Second, These disgusting, shitheel wastes of skin seem to be doing it correctly - see [1]28 USC 4104 [cornell.edu], I think.
I hope they all die of an embarrassing skin condition right after winning.
[1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/28/4104
Re: Sued in a US court (Score:4, Insightful)
I hope they keep going. Do I agree with them politically? Nope. But, what's interesting is they're able to continue on despite intense pressure on the part of big infrastructure providers and financial institutions. In other words, they've been able to keep going despite the centralized internet providers and basically everything else actively working against them, and the media repeatedly claiming that they've been taken offline for good only for them to be back up within hours if not minutes. They even came up with their own anti-ddos mechanism that appears to hold up against large scale attacks using relatively little infrastructure, basically by use of a decentralized server cluster along with a crypto interstitial going under the moniker "ddos retarding services".
It's nuts how not too long ago, progressives complained about centralized internet services, lack of net neutrality, the copyright cartel and the centralized financial system, but all of a sudden they love all of that once they realized they can use all of that to shit on the civil rights of people they don't like, because pesky things like the bill of rights gets in the way of them having the government do it.
Re: (Score:1)
> It's nuts how not too long ago, progressives complained about centralized internet services, lack of net neutrality, the copyright cartel and the centralized financial system, but all of a sudden they love all of that once they realized they can use all of that to shit on the civil rights of people they don't like, because pesky things like the bill of rights gets in the way of them having the government do it.
If you do something horribly unpopular, there's no God-given right that says you're entitled to earn a profit from it. Heck, even if it's something that seems offensive in only the most childish interpretation of the term, like removing an old man and a wooden barrel from your corporate logo, that's still fair game for that sweet, sweet, free market money to stop flowing your way.
Re: (Score:2)
> If you do something horribly unpopular, there's no God-given right that says you're entitled to earn a profit from it.
I don't believe there is either, and I don't believe they do either. Or maybe they do but don't talk about it; I don't know, but it's not relevant.
> Heck, even if it's something that seems offensive in only the most childish interpretation of the term, like removing an old man and a wooden barrel from your corporate logo, that's still fair game for that sweet, sweet, free market money to stop flowing your way.
Indeed. However -- and this is the big kicker -- what if people want to buy from them anyway, but the banks say "not happening"? I don't believe that is a problem if just one or even a thousand banks want to do that. But, what if there's effectively a cartel of them that dominate the most commonly used means of payment, and if one of them says no, then they all a
Re: (Score:2)
> Indeed. However -- and this is the big kicker -- what if people want to buy from them anyway, but the banks say "not happening"?
Some legitimate businesses (marijuana dispensaries come to mind) do have to operate under those conditions - they typically accept cash and sometimes cryptocurrency. Illegitimate businesses also somehow manage to find ways to earn profit, so I don't buy for one second that it's impossible to work around. It's just not easy to run a hate speech site, and honestly there's nothing in the 1A that says the government has to proactively take steps regulating various industries to make it easier - just that the
Re:Sued in a US court (Score:5, Informative)
> why would Ofcom care what a US court decides?
Because, if the US court decides that this UK enforcement action is not in keeping with US law (and US UK treaties), then the US government is duty bound to intercede on behalf of the US business. It becomes a political matter between sovereign nations instead of a business vs a sovereign nation.
One of the functions of the USTR (United States Trade Representative) is to intercede with foreign nations on behalf of US business interests. With a court decision backing the business, the USTR cannot simply ignore the request to intervene -they are legally required to do so.
Re: (Score:2)
Aren't at least some parts of the GOP in favour of this though? Porn bans, age verification etc. I read that some states introduced it, Republican ones. Some sites blocked them in response.
I wonder if there could be unintended consequences. If a foreign state can't require them to do age checks, can a US state where they aren't based require it?
Re: (Score:2)
> If a foreign state can't require them to do age checks, can a US state where they aren't based require it?
Yep, [1]the SCOTUS upheld Texas's age verification law. [apnews.com] It's entirely ass backwards to expect websites to comply with all the laws of everywhere they could possibly be accessed from, but here we are.
[1] https://apnews.com/article/internet-age-verification-supreme-court-def346d7bf299566a3687d8c4f224fec
Re: (Score:3)
> Aren't at least some parts of the GOP in favour of this though? Porn bans, age verification etc.
Sure. That is a political issue, so the USTR might conceivably ignore requests for intervention... unless there is a court order to back up the request. Even with a court order, the USTR can decide that it is not in the interest of the United States to act on the matter. But they would be compelled to make an official decision -on the record (something no official wants). The court order could also be used to shield the business from bank actions, etc.
> I wonder if there could be unintended consequences. If a foreign state can't require them to do age checks, can a US state where they aren't based require it?
No. It is a separate issue. No relevant precedent
There is a bigger game at play here (Score:4, Interesting)
If 4chan/Kiwifarms were to win, it would put many US based CDNs with existing contractual agreements into a catch-22. They would no longer be able to use the excuse of a need to comply with UK laws in relation to US websites, as a US court will have set a precedent that there is no legal need to comply with it, and thus no excuses to censor US websites, ran on US CDN servers, operated by a US CDN, on behalf of the whims of the UK government, or any other hypothetical future UK government.
This then puts sheepish third-party companies in the awkward position of having to justify complying with Ofcom requirements to the detriment of their own user base but not that of say Roscomnadzor or any other stupid government-related censorship organisation, and any justifications they did make, they would have to put explicitly in their terms and conditions for anyone to read, as it would form part of a material contractual agreement.
I hope 4chan/Kiwifarms set the precedent they need and I hope our Labour government here in the UK learns a very big lesson about who the Internet really belongs to, namely, us, the users.
Re: (Score:2)
Except that some US states enforce age verification too now.
Re: (Score:2)
Cloudflare has no intention of complying either, also KF was booted off cloudflare a few years back for terrorism.
Re: (Score:2)
> Surely if the same principle applies - why would Ofcom care what a US court decides?
It does apply. I believe the terms of the suit here to be symbolic, effectively a f-you to Ofcom and putting them on a receiving end of the same bullshit they dish out to other companies who have no business in the UK. Even if a court finds in favour of 4chan there's no actual impact. But it's doing what it needs to: raising awareness.
Re: (Score:2)
These sites should just block visitors from the UK because they have no intent of complying anyway.