Collective Shout welcomes today’s release of preliminary findings from the Age Assurance Technology Trial (AATT).
Collective Shout is a member of the Age Assurance Stakeholder Advisory Board. We led the campaign to secure an Australian trial and spearheaded an open letter signed by more than 50 child protection and women’s safety advocates calling on the Federal Government to reverse its earlier decision against a trial.
The independent evaluation of digital age assurance systems has released 12 preliminary findings following legal, ethical and stakeholder review processes. A total of 53 organisations took part.
The Age Check Certification Scheme (ACCS) found that age assurance can be done in Australia “privately, robustly and effectively in alignment with the international standards used during the Trial and with no significant technological barriers to implementation.”
Tony Allen, Project Director of the AATT, said the finding “underscores the readiness of Australian service providers and technology partners to meet age-related access requirements in both online and offline environments.These solutions are technically feasible, can be integrated flexibly into existing services and can support the safety and rights of children online.”
Movement Director Melinda Tankard Reist said that while Collective Shout awaited access to all findings and the opportunity to review the final report, initial indications were hopeful.
We lobbied for years to arrive at this point and provided evidence before Federal and State inquiries on the links between pornography exposure and violence against women and girls.
We documented the rise of Harmful Sexual Behaviours in schools in our ‘Sexual Harassment of Teachers’ report published late last year in partnership with parenting expert and author Maggie Dent. The report was an analysis of data from a survey of 1000 teachers.
We also shared the devastating accounts from parents whose child was exposed to rape, sadism, incest and torture porn by a predatory multi billion dollar industry grooming the next generation of consumers.
We note that wherever Age Verification/Assurance laws have been implemented, Pornhub (Aylo) shuts up shop in the state because it prefers to do that than comply.
We also appreciated the observations of AATT Stakeholder Advisory Board Chair and former child sexual abuse investigator Jon Rouse today that any reliance on platforms to protect children from exposure to online harm had “epically failed” and that harm was accelerating rapidly, requiring a strong response.
We cannot allow the vested interests of the sex industry to derail this final stage.
Contact: Melinda Tankard Reist: email: [email protected]
June 20, 2025
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