A legal challenge is moving ahead against the government's controversial decision to abandon age verification for pornography websites. 

Plans to introduce age checks and penalties for sites hosting extreme porn were included in Part 3 of the Digital Economy Act 2017.

Despite being approved by Parliament, and strong support from children's charities and women's groups, the plans were dropped in 2019 after years of delays.

The High Court has now granted permission for a judicial review of the government's controversial decision in a move welcomed by Christian charity, CARE, which has led a yearslong campaign for age verification to be introduced.

CARE spokesperson James Mildred said the legal intervention was "vitally important" to the protection of children who have been "badly let down" by the government's failure to implement tougher restrictions on online pornography.

"Part 3 would have stopped vulnerable children and young people stumbling onto commercial porn sites and it would have appointed a regulator with powers to punish sites that host vile content, glorifying sexual violence. It was widely supported and still is to this day, with a majority of UK adults backing these safeguards," he said. 

"For the sake of millions of children in the UK who have lacked protections for the last four years as a result of poor policy decisions, we hope this judicial review succeeds.

"Ministers can, of course, avoid the taxpayer burden incurred by defending its decision by doing the right thing and agreeing to implement Part 3 now."

Research by CARE has revealed widespread public concern over the harmful effects of pornography. 

A recent study conducted for the charity by Savanta ComRes found that 6 in 10 UK adults are "concerned that pornography is inspiring sexual violence against women and girls."

Seven in 10 expressed support for government action to stop websites from publishing extreme forms of pornography that portray violent or non-consensual sex.