The operator of pornography site Fapello has been fined £630,000 by Ofcom for failing to introduce any age verification checks for UK users — part of a growing crackdown on adult sites that have ignored laws designed to keep children out.
Since July 2025, all sites hosting adult content have been legally required to use “highly effective” age assurance to ensure visitors are at least 18. But when Ofcom opened an investigation into Fapello in November, it found the company had not only failed to implement any checks but also did not respond to requests for information on time.
“Ofcom fines Fapello £630,000 for no age checks; watchdog warns age verification is mandatory for UK porn sites.”
On Thursday, the regulator imposed a £600,000 penalty for the absence of age checks and an additional £30,000 for the delayed response. “Age checks are no longer optional for porn sites in the UK,” said George Lusty, Ofcom’s director of enforcement. “They are a cornerstone of our laws to protect children from content they should not be seeing.” He added: “Providers also need to know that if they don’t supply accurate information to us on time, when we request it, they should expect to face enforcement action, including fines.”
Fapello has since blocked UK visitors, but Ofcom said it would continue to monitor the site’s compliance.
The fine is one of several handed down by the regulator in recent months. In May, Ofcom fined YoungTek Solutions £600,000 for similar failings, and before that it levied a £1.35m penalty on another adult site operator. Yet the effectiveness of Ofcom’s enforcement has come under scrutiny. In December it emerged that the regulator had never heard from a firm that was handed a £1m fine, raising questions about whether monetary penalties alone were enough to force compliance. (That company later began following the rules.)
Ofcom remains locked in a bizarre dispute with the online message board 4chan over a £520,000 fine. A lawyer for the site has repeatedly mocked the regulator’s threats of further action by sending AI-generated cartoon images of hamsters.
The regulator has set out approved methods for age verification, including credit card checks, photo ID matching, and age estimation using a selfie. Whatever method is chosen, it must be “technically accurate, robust, reliable and fair”, Ofcom says.
On Thursday, Ofcom also announced a new investigation into another porn provider, Bit Hive, over concerns that one of its age-check methods “may not be highly effective”. The question now is whether fines — or cartoons — will finally make the industry comply.