All the states Pornhub is blocked in now
On December 2, 2025, it was reported that Pornhub, one of the most prominent adult entertainment websites, has been blocked in 23 U.S. states due to the enforcement of age-verification laws. These laws, which mandate that users provide government-issued identification or other forms of verification to access sites with explicit content, have been gaining traction since Louisiana became the first state to implement such regulations a couple of years ago. The legal landscape shifted significantly in June when the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Texas’s age-verification law, setting a precedent that has encouraged other states to follow suit. As a result, states like Alabama, Florida, and Texas have joined the ranks of those restricting access to Pornhub, with Louisiana users facing an 80% decline in site traffic after the implementation of ID verification requirements.
Despite the intentions behind these laws—to protect minors from accessing adult content—experts argue that they may not effectively serve their purpose. A preliminary study indicated that age verification methods are often circumvented by users employing VPNs or accessing non-compliant websites that do not enforce such measures. Additionally, the Florida Attorney General is currently suing foreign-based porn sites for failing to comply with age verification requirements. Critics, including Aylo, Pornhub’s parent company, contend that these laws are inadvertently pushing users toward less regulated and potentially dangerous corners of the internet. They argue that the current approach to age verification not only compromises user safety and privacy but also raises concerns about free speech and anonymity online.
As the adult industry grapples with these challenges, there are apprehensions regarding the future, especially with the potential return of conservative policies under a second Trump administration. The conservative policy outline, known as Project 2025, includes measures that some fear could lead to broader restrictions on pornography, with age-verification laws seen as a “back door” to such a ban. Industry experts advocate for alternative solutions, such as device-level filters, to better protect minors while preserving user privacy and safety. As these age-verification laws continue to evolve, the impact on both the adult industry and the broader internet landscape remains a critical issue for stakeholders and advocates alike.
UPDATE: Dec. 2, 2025, 1:11 p.m. EST
This article has been updated given the enactment of Missouri’s age-verification law.
The explicit tube site
Pornhub
is now blocked in 23 U.S. states.
This is due to
age-verification laws
. These laws vary state by state, but typically require visitors of a site with over a third of explicit content to submit a government ID or other form of age authentication.
Louisiana
was the first state to enact such a bill a couple of years ago, and now others have followed suit. In June, the
Supreme Court deemed Texas’s age-verification law
constitutional, setting a precedent for such bills that come before and after.
SEE ALSO:
Porn censorship is going to destroy the entire internet
According to one preliminary study,
age verification won’t work
to keep minors off porn sites. This is because of software like VPNs that allow someone to appear to be in a different location, and because of non-compliant websites. (The
Florida attorney general is suing foreign-based porn sites
for not instituting age verification.) Yet, these laws keep getting passed — and are
encroaching on non-explicit websites
as well, experts told Mashable.
While Pornhub is not blocked in Louisiana, it is blocked in these states, a Pornhub representative confirmed to Mashable:
Alabama
Arizona
Arkansas
Florida
Georgia
Idaho
Indiana
Kansas
Kentucky
Mississippi
Missouri
Montana
Nebraska
North Carolina
North Dakota
Oklahoma
South Carolina
South Dakota
Tennessee
Texas
Utah
Virginia
Wyoming
Pornhub isn’t blocked in Ohio
despite the state’s age-verification law, due to a clause stating that establishing age verification methods doesn’t apply to a provider of an interactive computer service (Aylo considers itself one).
In Louisiana, where users must submit ID to view Pornhub, the site has seen traffic decline by around 80 percent, Aylo (Pornhub’s parent company) told Mashable.
“These people did not stop looking for porn. They just migrated to darker corners of the internet that don’t ask users to verify age, that don’t follow the law, that don’t take user safety seriously, and that often don’t even moderate content. In practice, the laws have just made the internet more dangerous for adults and children,” Aylo stated when asked for comment by Mashable back in January.
In a statement to Mashable, Aylo continued:
First, to be clear, Aylo has publicly supported age verification of users for years, but we believe that any law to this effect must preserve user safety and privacy, and must effectively protect children from accessing content intended for adults.
Unfortunately, the way many jurisdictions worldwide have chosen to implement age verification is ineffective, haphazard, and dangerous. Any regulations that require hundreds of thousands of adult sites to collect significant amounts of highly sensitive personal information is putting user safety in jeopardy. Moreover, as experience has demonstrated, unless properly enforced, users will simply access non-compliant sites or find other methods of evading these laws.
Industry experts say that, in addition to not working for their intended purpose, age verification laws also raise concerns about privacy protection and safety since websites now have to host (even more of) people’s personal information. It will be harder to be anonymous online, which experts warn is dangerous to free speech. Adult industry experts Mashable spoke to in an
explainer on age-verification laws
advocated for device-level filters, as did Aylo in its statement.
SEE ALSO:
YouTube will begin using AI for age verification next week
Some in the adult industry worry about what Trump’s second presidential term will bring due to the conservative policy outline
Project 2025
and its measures to ban porn. One of Project 2025’s authors,
Russell Vought, was caught on a secret recording
stating that age-verification laws are the “back door” to a broader porn ban.
Eric
Eric is a seasoned journalist covering US Tech & AI news.
