Suspicious bots flood Republicans’ mentions after Texas requires age verification on major websites
On Thursday, Pornhub pulled out of Texas in response to a lawsuit from Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) demanding the site implement mandatory age verification. Republican politicians and right-wing influencers publicly celebrated the move on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.
Since Elon Musk took over, the platform has become overwhelmed with pornography and spam, so those celebratory posts were flooded with comments from pornbots.
“Pornhub has now disabled its website in Texas,” Paxton wrote victoriously. “Sites like Pornhub are on the run because Texas has a law that aims to prevent them from showing harmful, obscene material to children.”
“P░*░S░S░Y░ ░I░N░ ░B░I░O░,” a bot commented on Paxton’s post.
X currently does not have any age verification requirement for users.
Texas State Rep. Nate Schatzline (R), who has said he believes all pornography should be banned, also celebrated Pornhub leaving Texas and received identically ironic responses.
“BOOM! Proud to have fought ALL session to require online ID verification for pornography,” Schatzline posted on X. “Thank you @KenPaxtonTX for defending our bill! We must END the sexualization of children. This is step one to TAKING DOWN the predatory porn industry!
“P░*░S░S░Y░ ░I░N░ ░B░I░O░,” a bot wrote under Schatzline’s post.
Texan right-wing influencers such as Sarah Fields were put in a similar situation after reveling over the news that Pornhub is no longer accessible in Texas (without a VPN).
“Texas didn't ban Pornhub,” Fields wrote on X. “We placed an age restriction on it. Pornhub wants your children so bad, they got mad about it and left Texas.”
“░L░I░N░K░ ░I░N░ ░B░I░O░,” another porn spambot responded.
Observers were highly amused by the pornbot spam on such posts. “Puppy in bio,” one joked. Another pointed out that porn is “readily available” on X.
By all accounts, Musk’s efforts to rid X of spambots have been a miserable failure. A 2023 analysis conducted by SparkToro and Followerwonk suggested nearly 20% of active accounts are fake or spam. Even verified accounts have been found to promote notorious investment scams. But the pornbot spam is perhaps the most visible sign of the website’s degradation under Musk’s leadership. Musk himself has even acknowledged it.
“Stopping crypto/porn spam bots is not easy, but we’re working on it,” Musk recently posted on X in response to a complaint about the “the ‘p*ssy in bio’ problem.”
X doesn’t merely have a problem with vanilla porn featuring consenting adults. Child sex abuse material is such a serious issue on the platform that the Australian government fined the company $384,000 for not providing enough information about how it’s dealing with such content.
Paxton’s lawsuit against Pornhub and its parent company Aylo is over the age-verification law. HB 1181, that Texas passed last year. A host of civil liberties groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union, have opposed the law. On March 7, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in Texas ruled that the age-verification component of the law could stand. Various legal experts believe that HB 1181 is unconstitutional and that the court’s decision runs afoul of previously settled law.
Even though pornography is easily found on X, none of the right-wing figures celebrating their victory over Pornhub have targeted Musk’s platform, which has seen a notable rightward shift since the technology mogul bought it for $44 billion and started cozying up with Republicans and boosting antisemitic content.
It remains to be seen whether Paxton and other lawmakers will consistently apply their principles by targeting X for being riddled with pornography.
We probably shouldn’t hold our breath, however. Prior to Musk’s takeover, Paxton announced two separate investigations into X: one accusing it of a “coordinated cancellation of Trump & conservative voices/platforms,” another for allegedly underreporting the number of fake bot accounts on the platform.
After Musk bought Twitter and renamed it X, Paxton stopped investigating the company and started investigating its critics.
“Today I opened an investigation into Media Matters for potential fraudulent activity after X CEO Elon Musk accused the left-wing media watchdog group of manipulating data on the social media platform,” Paxton declared in November.
Paxton may not come for X anytime soon, but Pornhub may return to Texas. There’s a chance that the Texas Supreme Court will overrule the Fifth Circuit Court decision upholding the age verification requirement.
In the meantime, Texas residents who previously used Pornhub will just have to find their smut in the replies to Paxton’s posts.
The internet is chaotic—but we’ll break it down for you in one daily email. Sign up for the Daily Dot’s web_crawlr newsletter here to get the best (and worst) of the internet straight into your inbox.
Sign up to receive the Daily Dot’s Internet Insider newsletter for urgent news from the frontline of online.
The post Suspicious bots flood Republicans’ mentions after Texas requires age verification on major websites appeared first on The Daily Dot.