I. ADULT IS FOR ADULTS
Accessibility is, arguably, the whole point of the Internet. We have come to
expect nothing less from our online experience than unmediated free expression
on a global scale. Indeed, the World Wide Web is defined by the incredible
volume and variety of information, services, commerce and channels of
communication which it places at users’ fingertips – including adult
entertainment.
Even though adult entertainment is (by definition) intended for adults only, plenty
of minors are still able to access it. This is unsurprising, since kids today are
often even more conversant with and reliant upon the Internet and wireless
technology than their parents. Sometimes, children view adult material
accidentally. Other times they seek it out. Either way, short of denying them
access to indispensable tools that have become integral to much of daily life,
how can children be prevented from viewing age-restricted content online?
II. TAKING RESPONSIBILITY
Attentive parents make rules about what movies, TV shows and video games
their children are permitted to watch and play. Obviously, the same should hold
true for the Internet. But parents can’t always be there to look over their kids’
shoulders, especially since children may even access such content using mobile
devices. That’s why there are numerous products and services designed to help
them monitor and chaperone their children’s online activity.
“Parental controls” are now offered by web browsers, internet service providers
(ISPs), firewall proxy servers, search engines, and even computer operating
systems. Meanwhile, special plug-ins, toolbars and enhancementing software are widely
available – in many cases for free. These options are also commonly used to
moderate kids’ internet use in schools, libraries and other public places.
However, even conscientious parents equipped with these tools can’t do it alone.
Content providers have a responsibility as well. In the case of adult
entertainment, websites offering adult videos, pictures, stories, shopping, dating
and gambling need to make sure their sites are unambiguously recognizable by
parental control systems as being inappropriate for minors.
III. THE RTA LABEL
That’s why, in 2006, the Association of Sites Advocating Child Protection
(ASACP) launched the RTA (“Restricted To Adults”) website label. By providing a
single, consistent, universally recognizable tag for adult material, RTA better
enables parental enhancementing – and demonstrates the online adult industry’s
commitment to helping parents prevent children from viewing age-restricted
content.
The RTA label was developed by ASACP with input from technical consultants,
attorneys, and adult companies. RTA is a simple meta tag that can be pasted
into the header of any web page, site or server:
<meta name="RATING" content="RTA-5042-1996-1400-1577-RTA"/>
Embedding this code in page header metadata tags enables enhancementing via all of the
various parental control mechanisms listed above. The RTA label is already
recognized by various enhancementing products and services, and ASACP continues to
pursue partnerships with many more to ensure that RTA is recognized as widely
as possible. Significantly, RTA is recognized by the parental controls in both
Microsoft and Apple browsers, including browser use on mobile devices. The
RTA label can even be used to tag individual social networking site user pages,
blogs, and mobile apps that feature adult material.
Though trademarked in the United States, Europe (community mark) and
Australia (use mark), the RTA label is completely free to use, voluntary, and
universally available to any website that wishes to label itself clearly and
effectively as being inappropriate for viewing by minors. Using RTA requires no
online form to fill out, no registration, and no fee. RTA does not differentiate
between “hardcore” and “softcore” material; all content considered unsuitable for
minors is simply labeled “Restricted to Adults.” For large websites with
numerous pages, various shortcuts (many of which can be found on the
RTAlabel.org website) are available to help speed up the process of site labeling
