Sure, but more of the internet is sanitized compared to 10-15 years ago, which is likely what they meant. More restrictions in place over more domains. Couple that with the fact that more people spend their time on fewer sites these days than they did in 2007, and it's hard to really argue that the internet most people experience isn't more content restricted.
Most of this stuff used to spread word to mouth. It still does.
'Funny people' on Reddit still post links to NSFW in SFW spaces. Googling something angsty can be interpreted as a search for XXX. Twitter isn't exactly safe either, and can teach a few people NSFW words to get curious about. R34, DeviantArt etc. are all alive, and anything hentai related is far more prominent and mainstream than before. People interact on these sites and suggest enough to instill curiosities.
It's not as on the nose as old flash game sites showing a highlighted "18+" with a shitty age verification or a random ad sending them into the rabbit hole, but it's still very much there.
