Age verification laws drive surge in bypass discussions and VPN downloads

As countries like the UK and Australia introduce online age verification laws, online discussions about bypassing these systems are rising, and so are VPN downloads. Cybernews analyzed Reddit discussions related to bypassing age verification between May 2025 and April 2026, as well as VPN download trends in the UK and Australia. The study found that there were increases in both Reddit discussions and VPN downloads when age verification laws came into effect.

Hundreds of posts, thousands of comments: age verification bypass discussions spike as laws come into effect

Across 12 months of Reddit data, from May 6, 2025, to April 30, 2026, Cybernews identified 241 discussions related to bypassing age verification systems. The number of new bypass-related posts grew steadily over the study period, from just one thread in May 2025 to 65 threads in April 2026.

User comments on these Reddit posts increased as well, with two major spikes observed shortly after age verification laws took effect:

• The first spike was in August 2025, right after the UK’s Online Safety Act’s age verification measure came into effect on July 25, 2025. There was a 460% surge in comments compared to the previous month.
• The second spike was in March 2026, when Australia enforced age verification requirements for adult content platforms. There was a 47% increase in comments compared to the previous month.

The UK and Australia were likely not the only countries driving this trend. In the US, various states enforced age verification laws throughout late 2025 and early 2026, while the EU has also been discussing banning social media for kids under 16. These events likely also contributed to the growing interest online in bypassing age verification techniques.

In the UK, VPN usage spiked in August 2025, right after age verification was enforced

There was a sharp increase in VPN downloads in the UK right after age verification requirements were enforced under the Online Safety Act. There were more than two million VPN downloads in the UK in August alone. VPN downloads remained elevated after the law came into effect – monthly downloads mostly stayed above one million.

“It looks like age verification laws are not stopping determined users from accessing restricted content. And it’s not just kids – many privacy-conscious users simply do not want to share sensitive personal data online, as age verification often requires uploading an ID or doing a facial scan. As long as these methods remain so privacy-invasive while bypass techniques remain widely accessible, these laws are unlikely to achieve their intended effect”, says Aras Nazarovas, Senior Information Security Researcher at Cybernews.

In Australia, VPN usage spiked with adult content restrictions, not social media restrictions

Australia’s first major age verification law came into effect on December 10, 2025 – social media was banned for users under 16. After this, there was a slight increase in VPN downloads and Reddit discussions related to age verification bypass techniques.

A much larger surge in VPN downloads in Australia came in March 2026, when the country enforced an adult content ban for users under 18. There were more than 871,000 new VPN downloads in March, nearly three times higher than the previous month. Reddit posts and threads also increased during this time.

However, the surge in VPN downloads is not necessarily just because of minors trying to access adult content. Some platforms chose to restrict Australian users altogether instead of implementing age verification, which may have also driven higher VPN adoption. Also, some people simply have privacy concerns related to age verification, which is why they opt for VPNs instead of verifying their age.

Methodology:

Cybernews analyzed Reddit discussions related to bypassing age verification systems between May 6, 2025, and April 30, 2026 using Reddit’s API. Site-wide searches across Reddit were conducted using keywords related to age verification and bypass methods. Results were deduplicated by post ID, and full comment threads were collected for each matching discussion. A large language model (Claude Opus 4.6 via nexos.ai) was used to identify bypass-related discussions based on post content and top comments. VPN download data for the UK and Australia was obtained from a third party and included app download data from the Google Play Store and the Apple App Store.