Below you’ll find some of the common questions we’ve received about Age Verification requirements for Adult/18+ creators from our payment processing partners. We will add additional answers to any other common questions that emerge.
Quicklinks:
- About the requirement and who needs to do it
- The Age Verification process
- Data privacy
- Miscellaneous
About the requirement and who needs to do it
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Payment processors like Mastercard and Visa require Patreon to have all creators sharing sexually explicit creations or creations that include nudity verify that they are over the age of 18. Patreon relies on this payments infrastructure to accept digital pledge payments and enable creators to earn on Patreon.
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This payment processor requirement applies to creators in the Adult/18+ category.
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Yes, you are eligible to recategorize from "Adult/18+" to "Safe for All Audiences," which opts you out of Age Verification. Here’s how you can do that.
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Yes, if you remove every piece of sexually explicit content or nudity on your page, you are eligible to recategorize from “Adult/18+” to “Safe for All Audiences,” which opts you out of Age Verification. Again, here’s how you can do that.
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You are responsible for obtaining the written consent of any real humans who participate in works on your Patreon. You should use this consent form template to do so and retain all participant consent documentation indefinitely. Upon request from a payment partner, Patreon may ask you to provide this documentation, which would then be shared with the requesting payment partner to demonstrate compliance with their rules.
The Age Verification process
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The majority of creators will submit a government-issued identification showing full name, birthdate, and photo (like a license, passport, or national ID), and you’ll submit photos of that document to a third party we detail below. You’ll also snap a photo of yourself in that moment (in other words, a selfie), that will be matched to the photo from the ID to confirm it’s you. We expect the process to take approximately 3-5 minutes to complete.
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You’ve shared lots of ideas for how we can prioritize inclusivity throughout this process. With that in mind, we’ve developed a list of alternative (non-government-issued) IDs we accept. If you do not have a government-issued ID, you are eligible to use alternative IDs.
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You are eligible to use alternative IDs if you do not have a government-issued ID or you have a serious privacy concern with using your government-issued ID.
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We have prepared a broad list of documents that you may use to verify with an alternative ID if you do not have a government-issued ID. Collectively, the documents you submit must show your full name, date of birth, and photo. All documents must show the same name, or else official name change paperwork must also be provided.
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If your address is out of date please update it. Accurate location data is required for tax information reporting in some jurisdictions, and inaccurate addresses can result in inaccurate reporting and/or inaccurate sales tax/VAT application. You can update your address in your tax form.
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We've enlisted a third-party vendor called Jumio that specializes in identity verification. And yes, Jumio is global in scope and able to accommodate the vast majority of languages for the convenience of Patreon creators.
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Creators let us know that maximizing the number of supportable languages and countries was important to you. Stripe is a little bit more limited on those fronts, whereas Jumio instead enables us to make life easier for creators by supporting nearly every country, language, and form of government-issued identification.
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We are leveraging Jumio’s verification product meaning that your information will be processed end-to-end by Jumio, but you don’t have to leave Patreon’s website to complete the process. You’ll be able to begin the process from a desktop browser, mobile browser, or from within our iOS and Android apps. However, your progress will not be carried over if you attempt to switch between devices in the middle of the process. Verification only takes a few minutes to complete, so we expect most creators to be able to finish the process once they get started.
Additional FAQ
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Creator privacy is incredibly important to us, and we made sure to select a vendor (Jumio) that specializes in identification verification. Jumio has received multiple information security certifications such as ISO/IEC 27001:2013, PCI DSS, and SOC2 Type 2. You can read more about what those certifications signify about Jumio’s security strength here.
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Patreon will not use the information you provide during verification to update any of the public information on your account or campaign. We will never publicly share or sell personal information.
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If you're submitting a government-issued ID, please ensure that you are submitting a clear picture of the complete document. If you’d prefer to redact your address from the government-issued ID you are submitting for verification, please reach out to us.
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We recognize that asking for identification is deeply sensitive and personal, and that not everyone uses their legal or birth names in their daily lives. The option mentioned above [by which you can submit alternative IDs](https://support.patreon.com/hc/en-us/articles/19506736499213-Guidelines-for-Adult-18-creators-age-verifying-with-alternative-non-government-issued-IDs#zp-2-0), may be a good path for you. We will never publicly share the name from the identification you submit.
Miscellaneous
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If your new page is Adult/18+ and will feature sexually explicit content or nudity, then yes, you’ll complete the verification process again. We are unable to transfer verification status or verified information from one account to another.