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February 5, 2025

OnlyFans dodges UK probe into underage users

Ofcom launched an investigation into the adult-only subscription service in May

Martin Coulter

2 min read

Britain’s media regulator Ofcom has dropped its investigation into whether OnlyFans was doing enough to stop under-18s using its platform.

The London-based adult subscription site boasts more than 300m users worldwide, with some of the platform’s most successful creators earning millions of dollars a year.

Ofcom first announced its probe into OnlyFans last year, citing concerns over the company’s age verification measures, designed to stop underage users accessing explicit content.

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On Tuesday, the watchdog said it had closed this investigation: “Where appropriate, Ofcom’s supervision team will continue to engage with OnlyFans around the way it implements measures to protect children from restricted material.”

However, Ofcom said it would continue to examine whether OnlyFans provided complete and accurate responses to its earlier requests for information.

An OnlyFans spokesperson said: “We welcome today’s decision from Ofcom. Since 2021, OnlyFans has used the government-approved age-assurance provider Yoti to check that UK fans are over the age of 18.

"At all times, OnlyFans’ age assurance was set to at least 20 years old. OnlyFans is, and has always been, confident that these measures are sufficient to meet our obligations to protect under-18s from accessing restricted material.”

Martin Coulter

Martin Coulter is Sifted's news editor, based in London. You can follow him on LinkedIn and X