On March 13th, 2025, Governor Gordon signed House Bill 43. After long debate and discussion, this bill came into effect upon its signing and took full force on July 1st. This law requires, in broad strokes, that websites offering adult content must request age verification to ensure all users viewing the content are 18 or older.
This bill enacts a law that essentially states, “material harmful to minors” to verify an age of 18 or up. The law creates a right for “any parent or guardian of a minor who is aggrieved by a violation of” the law to sue for damages, court costs, fees, and $5,000 per “failure to perform age verification”. There are no thresholds or classification requirements whatsoever, meaning any site with even minimal adult content is considered in violation if charged. Acceptable ID forms require a variety of sources, including driver’s licenses and military IDs. These verification documents must be deleted from site records upon use as included in a safeguard within the bill.
This has been accomplished through circumventing restrictions involving First Amendment violations by utilizing the concept of private right-of-action enforcement. Parents and guardians can sue noncompliant websites to enforce discipline and penalties without the state having any direct action. The US Supreme Court affirmed similar rules in Texas and age verification has already been established in 18 other states with clear success. Sites like Pornhub have released statements opposing these regulations under the justification that it will only drive pornography users to less reliable and legally abiding sites that will not verify age or comply with the laws. Many sites like Pornhub have forgone any chance of ineffective verification and have chosen instead to block any IP address from states that require the age check, like Wyoming and Texas.
Organizations like the ACLU of Wyoming and Free Speech coalition, along with multiple legislators, like Rep. Provenza and Senator Rothfuss, opposed the bill as well, contending that it undermines privacy and restricts constitutionally protected forms of online speech.. In addition, the bill has been cited as shortsighted and too broad, trying to protect minors in ineffective and potentially harmful ways. With most states holding a 33% adult content threshold rule, Wyoming’s lack of a threshold is representative of a push by many states towards a stricter regulatory policy standard within many of these laws.
With advocates of the law claiming it is encouraging technical adaptation of parental controls, there is an emphasis on the need to protect children from predators. Louisiana’s law of a similar nature reportedly led to an 80% drop in pornography traffic, even from minors. With this in mind, the decision becomes a debate between child safety and data privacy. When considering which is more important and which is being protected, many disagree on the topic, leading to controversy surrounding the
