Texas says goodbye to Pornhub — and hello to the top 10 VPNs
Pornhub, you can take away Texans' porn, but what you won't do is take away their determination to get their NSFW content — come hell or high water.
As we reported on Friday, Pornhub went dark in Texas. Why? The state has new age verification laws. As such, anyone who has a Texas IP is blocked from accessing the adult website.
"[W]e have made the difficult decision to completely disable access to our website in Texas," Pornhub said in a notice. "In doing so, we are complying with the law, as we always do, but hope that governments around the world will implement laws that actually protect the safety and security of our users."
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Unsurprisingly, this skyrocketed searches for the best VPNs. According to a SlashGear report sent to Mashable, searches for "Texas VPN" jumped by 1,750 percent in the past day. It also spotted a 1,600 percent increase for the phrase "How to access Pornhub."
Curious about which VPNs people are looking at as Pornhub becomes out of reach? Here's what SlashGear found:
Top 10 VPNs, according to Google Search trends
Proton VPN is, by far, the most popular VPNs appearing on search with an increase of 4,750 percent. Check out the full list:
1. Proton VPN - 4,750 percent
2. Open GX Mobile VPN - 300 percent
3. VPN hub - 300 percent
4. Tunnelbear - 130 percent
5. NordVPN - 100 percent
6. Mullvad VPN - 100 percent
7. Windscribe - 80 percent
8. Browsec VPN - 80 percent
9. Firefox VPN - 70 percent
10. Opera VPN - 50 percent
Interestingly, we happened to review Proton VPN. And according to Mashable's Haley Henschel, who's at the helm of our best VPNs buying guide, Proton VPN offers a free plan. But of course, the Plus tier is recommended for full access to its network, P2P support, up to 10 simultaneous connections, Tor access, and more.
If you have no interest in VPNs, we recommend checking out our Pornhub alternatives guide.
Topics Pornhub
Kimberly Gedeon, at Mashable since 2023, is a tech explorer who enjoys doing deep dives into the most popular gadgets, from the latest iPhones to the most immersive VR headsets. She's drawn to strange, avant-garde, bizarre tech, whether it's a 3D laptop, a gaming rig that can transform into a briefcase, or smart glasses that can capture video. Her journalism career kicked off about a decade ago at MadameNoire where she covered tech and business before landing as a tech editor at Laptop Mag in 2020.
