Like the UK, the Aussies thought it would be a wizard wheeze to “protect children” by forcing. Porn sites to ask for proof of user’s ages before letting them have access to their content.

But communications minister, Michelle Rowland said the federal government decided against forcing sites to bring in age verification technology, instead tasking the eSafety commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, to work with the industry to develop a new code to educate parents on how to access filtering software and limit children's access to such material or sites that are not appropriate.

"It is clear from the roadmap at present, each type of age verification or age assurance technology comes with its privacy, security, effectiveness or implementation issues," the government's response to the roadmap said.

The technology must work effectively without circumvention, must be able to be applied to pornography hosted outside Australia, and must not introduce the risk to personal information for adults who choose to access legal pornography, the government stated. "The roadmap clarifies that a decision to mandate age assurance is not yet ready to be taken."

ESafety will develop the new tranche of codes following the implementation the first set of industry codes in December this year. The government will also bring forward an independent statutory review of the Online Safety Act in 2024 to ensure it is fit for purpose. This review will be completed in this term of government. The UK's approach to age assurance will also be monitored as the UK is "a key likeminded partner." The report suggested trialling a pilot of age assurance technologies, but the government did not adopt this.

The report noted the government's development of a digital ID during the Optus and Medibank data breaches. Still, it said it was not suggesting the government ID be used for confirming ages on pornographic websites.