Attorney General Ken Paxton secured a landmark court order to cut off a pornographic website’s ability to operate under its domain name after the company failed to take measures to protect children from the harmful sexual content it published. This legal victory establishes a significant precedent for enforcing age-verification laws against non-compliant foreign operators.
In April 2024, Attorney General Paxton sued Kick Online Entertainment (“Kick”), the owner of the pornographic website motherless.com, for violating Texas’s age-verification law. He subsequently obtained a Default Judgment and Permanent Injunction requiring the company to stop publishing harmful sexual material to minors and implement reasonable age-verification measures. Kick Online, which openly describes itself as a “moral free” company, ignored the lawsuit and refused to comply with the court’s order. It continued publishing and distributing harmful sexual material that was accessible to minors in Texas.
Now, to secure compliance and safeguard Texas children, Attorney General Paxton has obtained a court-ordered writ directing Verisign, the company that maintains the “.com” domain registry, to place the domain “motherless.com” on a registry lock, hold, or similar status. Under the court’s order, Kick may only seek to replevy the domain by posting a $9.14 million bond conditioned on implementing age verification that complies with Texas law and satisfying the civil penalties previously awarded in the case.
“This court order establishes a huge precedent that websites can be stripped of their domain if they ignore the law and harm children with pornographic content,” said Attorney General Paxton. “This affirms that protecting children from pornographic content is not only about collecting a penalty but also shutting down websites that refuse to obey the law. My office will continue to take action against any website that harms kids by allowing them access to pornographic content.”
This writ demonstrates that Texas has the legal authority and the proven tools to reach beyond its borders and hold foreign operators accountable. The Office of the Attorney General will continue to use every available legal mechanism, including writs of attachment against domain names, to enforce Texas law and ensure that no company, regardless of where it is incorporated, can profit from exposing Texas children to harmful content. To read the order, click here.