That's not quite how it went. The government hinted that it might do so unless the ISPs implemented filters that people had to ask to opt-out of.

The ISPs jumped on adding a filtering choice for users in the form of a checkbox when they sign on. Something many of them had before. Some providers - notably the mobile providers - have defaulted to opt-out (since long before the government interference, on the basis that e.g. pay as you go sims can easily be obtained without providing id, and as a result they don't know if their subscribers are over 18), while most regular ISPs default to opt-in.

The government subsequently then did not propose any law, and issued triumphant press releases about protecting children, after Camerons advisers had been pleading with ISPs to at least make the checkboxes default to ticked. Largely the result was that they got mocked for not actually achieving any changes that made a difference to anything at all.

All the largest ISPs still filters child porn regardless of subscriber choice, but that's the only thing you're not able to turn off. Even that filtering is not covering nearly all ISPs.

All of the major ISPs and mobile networks now do it on a voluntary basis.

No laws have been passed yet to enforce ISPs to do this, just pressure from David Cameron and campaigns by the Daily Mail and 'parent' groups and stuff, although David Cameron did say if the recently implemented system was not effective enough they would have to legislate (the problem now, is whether the 4-8% takeup on all but one isp is 'effective'.)

Some ISPs are, apparently, asking for explicit confirmation with a phrase such as "So you are requesting access to sites that carry pornographical material", and if you want to access anything that the Government has decided to block, you must reply "Yes."

I have no doubt that lists of people who have opted-out will, at some point, be leaked.

I've opted out of these filters ever since they have been in place, Most providers will ask you during sign up if you wanted them on or off, I've always turned them off on day one. Since these filters have been in place I have been with (Who have the filters) Virgin Media, TalkTalk, Sky, 3 (Mobile internet) and I have never once recieved a letter from my ISP that tells me that I have opted out of the adult content filtering.

The UK government threatened to make it a legal requirement that all internet connections have filters for adult content on by default.

The major ISPs and mobile networks voluntarily put filtering in place by default to avoid the regulation.

The filters can usually be removed quite easily.

While there are some smaller ISPs that don't put filtering in place, they account for something like < 10% of the market.

edit because HN won't let me post a rebuttal to the reply below:

Private corporations can be compelled and coerced by the government in other ways that aren't readily publicized. If you think these companies enjoy wasting resources on porn filter then you're crazy. Wikipedia:

"Prime Minister David Cameron made it clear in July 2013 that his aim was to ensure that by the end of 2013 all ISPs would have a filtering system in place.[13] As a result three of the four major ISPs (TalkTalk, Sky and BT[14]) began applying default filtering to new customers in 2013[15] with the fourth major ISP, Virgin, doing so in February 2014.[16] Default filtering of existing customers was implemented by all four major ISPs during 2014 with the aim of ensuring that the system applied to 95% of all households by the end of the year.[17][18]"

This timing isn't a big coincidence. Elect a better PM (or indirectly elect considering this is the UK) if you don't want such shenanigans.

And the targeted demographic that should be protected - children - will find plenty of ways around it. Reddit and Twitter are easily accessed, Youtube has tons of soft porn that won't get filtered out, VPNs are everywhere - even free ones, like in Opera, and they Know about it - Tiktok has tons of soft porn, the list goes on.

Given they have gone a LONG way past that with a proposal of a default ISP block and opt-in requirement, we can safely be sure this has nothing to do with regulating children's access.

Inline with other new legislation, the real reason this legislation is being proposed is that it forces ISP's to pay to upgrade their infrastructure for real-time surveillance. In other words, it is the infrastructure angle that the government wants private companies to pay for. After all, how effectively can you censor if you do not eventually do it in real time.

You can think of it as "the last mile" for the Intelligence Services, a part of the the "Going Dark" problem as technology and information rapidly expands along vectors that were not available to private entities in the past. By fair means or foul, the UK government will get what it needs - either directly from its first direct real-time proposal or via these types of censoring proposals to apply pressure on ISPs.

The "for the children" argument has nothing to do with anything since at most merely forcing the ISPs to give a parental options to block porn would have been sufficient against young children. No block of any kind (ISP or not) would ever work against older children, obviously, since many of them tend to be the most sophisticated technology and even socially-connected users in the household.

It's widely known that UK ISPs and mobile networks put filtering in place by default. They did this to avoid the government passing a law to make it mandatory.

This often blocks VPNs and sites that may or may not be used to access adult content.

There is always a way to remove the block, typically with credit card/ID verification of some sort.

Three might be blocking some things that other networks aren't, but I imagine you'll find the other networks block some things that Three doesn't.

Here is a screenshot of one of the actual filters recently implemented (by an ISP called BT) with new accounts defaulting to the "Light" pre-set, which customers must opt out of: http://i.imgur.com/dWxORfJ.png

The amount of misinformation spread about this mythical "UK porn filter" is astounding, but I guess unsurprising as it fits completely into the orwellian surveillance state conspiracy theory agenda.

Cameron is pandering to worried parents who believe the internet is a bad place, and little Johnny must be protected by a filter. The government believe it will mean they'll win the next election. It's just politics.

It's nothing whatsoever about censorship. Anyone can opt out of the filters, and anyone can get past the filters with a couple of clicks.

edit: anyone downvoting actually live in the UK? Any of you actually have any hard facts? Or are you just regurgitating the crap you read on the internet.

The private companies avoid pesky government involvements, and the government can wash their hand of it if/when something goes wrong.

See also how UK ISPs delegate child porn filtering to a totally unaccountable organisation called the Internet Watch Foundation.

These content filters block large swaths of the internet. Urban Dictionary is the one that trips me up every time I change networks.

LGBTQIA+ related content has typically gotten caught up in this as well.

You’re lucky if your Internet operator does not care. Unfortunately, there’s plenty of places where censorship is rampant, under the guise of just “think of the children.”