The War on Porn Regular Updates about the Assault on The Adult Industry
Related Articles
A federal judge quietly slammed the brakes this week on a pair of lawsuits that were meant to test Kansas’ age-verification law — and in doing so, reminded everyone that the internet doesn’t neatly respect state lines, no matter how badly lawmakers might want it to.
Last year, a conservative anti-pornography group brought lawsuits against four adult websites on behalf of a 14-year-old Kansas resident and her mother. Two of those suits went after Titan Websites, which runs HentaiCity.com, and ICF Technology, which operates Jerkmate.com. The core claim was simple and familiar by now: the teenager allegedly accessed content on the sites without her age being verified.
But Judge Holly Teeter of the U.S. District Court for the District of Kansas wasn’t persuaded. She dismissed both cases outright, pointing to something that often gets lost in the political noise — jurisdiction still matters.
In the case against Titan Websites, Teeter ruled that the plaintiffs failed to show HentaiCity.com had “purposefully directed its activities at Kansas.”
“The contacts between Defendant and the forum were not due to discriminating, intentional conduct that targeted Kansas,” Teeter wrote. “Rather, they were the random, and fortuitous contacts inherent in the operation of an indiscriminate and universally accessible website … This is insufficient to support the exercise of specific personal jurisdiction.”
If you’ve ever run a website, that language probably lands with a thud of recognition. The internet is global by default. You don’t wake up deciding to “target Kansas” unless you’re buying billboards off I-70 or running a very specific ad campaign. Sometimes a click is just a click.
In a statement, the Free Speech Coalition welcomed the decision as a meaningful step forward.
“As the first age verification case filed by a private plaintiff to reach final resolution, the ruling suggests that private plaintiffs can lack personal jurisdiction to sue out-of-state website operators under the Kansas statute,” the statement reads.
The organization’s executive director said the ruling offers “critical guidance” for platforms trying to navigate age-verification laws in Kansas and beyond — a legal patchwork that’s getting harder to track by the month.
“While not precedent-setting, nor necessarily applicable in every case, the District Court’s ruling is an important victory against state laws enforced by private rights of action,” said Boden. “In the meantime, the threat of litigation is real, and we encourage our members to continue to comply with all applicable laws.”
That last part matters. This wasn’t a mic-drop that ends the conversation forever. The plaintiffs still have the option to appeal, and the broader legal fight is far from over.
Two other cases backed by the same group are still winding their way through the system. In the lawsuit against Multi Media LLC, which operates Chaturbate.com, the judge granted a motion to compel arbitration and paused the case while that process plays out. In the case against Techpump Solutions, which runs Superporn.com, the court hasn’t yet ruled on a motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction.
So yes, one door just closed — but plenty of others remain cracked open. And if there’s a lesson here, it’s this: the battle over age verification isn’t just about who clicks what. It’s about where the law thinks the internet actually lives.
