Another unrest is brewing in Thailand. This time, it's about porn.
A huge number of Thai people are furious with the government's decision that banned all access to PornHub and nearly 200 other pornographic websites, reports said.
Thailand loves porn. In fact, it spent more time on the wildly popular site PornHub compared to other countries, consistently keeping its place in the top 20 list of nations patronizing the site.
Thai Ministry of Digital Economy and Society signed the closure orders Tuesday restricting access to the adult sites URL, citing the country's Computer Crime Act of 2007.
DES minister Puttipong Punnakanta said the shutdown was part of new measures to block access to online pornography and gambling sites, which are illegal under Thai cybercrime law.
Anonymous Party, an activist organization, protested: "We want to reclaim PornHub. People are entitled to choices," CNN quoted the group as saying.
Much of the protest is happening in cyberspace, but some were willing to vent their ire on their loss of porn on the streets, with dozens of activists demonstrating outside Thailand's digital ministry with banners saying "Free Pornhub" and "Reclaim Pornhub."
The move by Thai regulators comes in the wake of stronger calls from conservatives for action by the DES against websites which they allege are weakening Thailand's traditional values and culture.
According to the Manushya Foundations director Emily Pradichit, Thailand is "a land of digital dictatorship, with conservatives in power trying to control what young people can watch, say and do online," CNN reported.
PornHub is available in more than 20 languages and boasts of more than 100 million unique online users per month. Experts said the closure of the site in Thailand -- which has a globally-known sex industry -- will be detrimental to the lucrative business in Bangkok, quoted as the controversial porn site's 10th largest market with New York, London, and Paris coming in the top three spots.
