Bowing to years of pressure, Starbucks reportedly plans to block customers from watching pornography at the retailer’s ubiquitous coffee shops.
"To ensure the Third Place remains safe and welcoming to all, we have identified a solution to prevent this content from being viewed within our stores and we will begin introducing it to our U.S. locations in 2019," a Starbucks representative said in an email to Business Insider, which first reported the decision.
The move comes after years of pressure from the internet-safety organization Enough Is Enough, BI reported – including a petition signed by 26,000 people attacking Starbucks for not following through on a 2016 commitment to block pornography websites.
The nonprofit launched a porn-free campaign aimed at both McDonald's and Starbucks in 2014, and had lauded the fast-food company for having "responded rapidly and positively," NBC News reported.
But Enough Is Enough head Donna Rice told NBC News Starbucks "won’t get an applause until they’ve actually implemented safe Wi-Fi filtering.”
Starbucks hasn’t disclosed how it plans to restrict porn-watching over its Wi-Fi.
But the vice president of YouPorn, a free pornographic video-sharing site and one of the 200 most-visited websites worldwide, sent a memo to staff banning Starbucks products from company offices starting Jan. 1, 2019, NBC News reported.
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