A lawsuit filed by more victims of the sex trafficking operation claims that Pornhub’s moderation staff ignored reports of their abuse videos.


Sixty-one additional women are suing Pornhub’s parent company, claiming that the company failed to take down videos of their abuse as part of the sex trafficking operation Girls Do Porn. They’re suing the company and its sites for sex trafficking, racketeering, conspiracy to commit racketeering, and human trafficking.

The complaint, filed on Tuesday, includes what it claims are internal emails obtained by the plaintiffs, represented by Holm Law Group, between Pornhub moderation staff. The emails allegedly show that Pornhub had only one moderator to review 700,000 potentially abusive videos, and that the company intentionally ignored repeated reports from victims in those videos.

The damages and restitution they seek amounts to more than $311,100,000. They demand a jury trial, and seek damages of $5 million per plaintiff, as well as restitution for all the money Aylo, the new name for Pornhub’s parent company, earned “marketing, selling and exploiting Plaintiffs’ videos in an amount that exceeds one hundred thousand dollars for each plaintiff.”

The plaintiffs are 61 more unnamed “Jane Doe” victims of Girls Do Porn, adding to the 60 that sued Pornhub in 2020 for similar claims.
Girls Do Porn was a federally-convicted sex trafficking ring that coerced young women into filming pornographic videos under the pretense of “modeling” gigs. In some cases, the women were violently abused. The operators told them that the videos would never appear online, so that their home communities wouldn’t find out, but they uploaded the footage to sites like Pornhub, where the videos went viral—and in many instances, destroyed their lives. Girls Do Porn was an official Pornhub content partner, with its videos frequently appearing on the front page, where they gathered millions of views.

read more: https://www.404media.co/girls-do-porn-victims-sue-pornhub-for-300-million/

archive: https://archive.ph/zQWt3#selection-593.0-609.599

  • Son_of_dad@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I always hated GDP videos cause the girls never looked like they wanted to be there, now I know why, they didn’t. There’s a lot of porn out there where the girl is very clearly not enjoying it or just laying there, I don’t know how anyone finds that hot.

    • Cryophilia@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Honestly I’m running into that a lot with women, especially younger women. They all want to be “dominated” and it does nothing for me.

        • Default_Defect@midwest.social
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          1 year ago

          Under no circumstances would I be comfortable if someone wanted me to simulate rape or being overly dominant.

          Its at best not what I’m into and at worst a way to catch a court date if the other person is an especially shit human, never mind how it throws clear communication straight out of the window.

          • Krauerking@lemy.lol
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            1 year ago

            No I’ve done it. Done properly it’s with full communication, clear limits, safe words and usually pre-setup and post aftercare which has been very cathartic and important time for my partners.

            It’s totally fine if it’s not something you are into but done properly it’s not something that is outside of communicated carefully and shouldn’t be causing court issues cause it’s definitely not something to just do without precise communication.

            I get that isn’t always reality but I just don’t want people to think it’s something that’s inherently only harmful.

            • Default_Defect@midwest.social
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              1 year ago

              Being done properly and with clear communication would fall under my “at best” scenario with it just not being my thing, but your comment is important. I never meant to make it sound like BDSM is inherently “dangerous” or whatever.

              • Krauerking@lemy.lol
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                1 year ago

                It’s fine, yeah I just saw the upvotes and the “no clear communication” thing and knew a partner who would want to write notes afterwards and had a full document of pre agreements and could feel her spirit telling me to not let that go unchallenged

                • Default_Defect@midwest.social
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                  1 year ago

                  Oh yes, I know someone that would have been the same way. She was adamant about clear expectations and establishing boundaries.

            • Enigma@sh.itjust.works
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              1 year ago

              Right. The BDSM world has very strict rules. If you’re ever with a partner who “wants to try bdsm” without multiple conversations beforehand, then walk away. Aftercare is also a huge and important part of BDSM.

        • phx@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Been there, uh, didn’t do that because it’s fucking creepy. Also no hitting or calling me “daddy”, which is super creepy IMO

      • wildginger@lemmy.myserv.one
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        1 year ago

        Or, like, half of the BDSM community who enjoy when this is roleplayed, like what everyone watching these videos thought it was.

        Unless you think anyone who plays video games with guns only find it fun cause theyre murderers?

      • WhyDoesntThisThingWork@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Many of these women did this consenually. Read the article: it says they were told it wouldn’t be posted on online. These women were more than happy to have sex on on film for money, they are just unhappy others found out about it. That is breach of contract but it isn’t rape.

        It says some of the women were violently abused which is totally fucked, that potentially is rape, but this suit includes both those groups and the difference is important. And the offenses are a world of difference between them.

        • mosiacmango@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          Firstly, Sex by misdirection is rape, flat out. If you agree to have sex with someone with a condom and take it off without their knowledge, you raped them. Saying “lets shoot a video that will never go public” is the same thing.

          Secondly, youre glomming onto one detail and ignoring all the other tactics they used to coerce and rape these woman. They would fly them out to an unfamiliar city for “modeling jobs,” and then demand thousands in payments if they backed out of doing porn. They would sometimes take nudes “for the modeling contract” the threaten to send them to friends/family/etc if they didn’t do porn. Other times, they directly used force and violence, locking them in rooms to kidnap them, or forcing them to do sex acts they dodnt consent at all to, even under duress.

          Then they would say “this video will never be public so if you just do it you get paid and all this goes away.” They then would upload the videos to pornhub. If im not mistaken, the owner of GDP, also ran a website with the girls real info on it.

          On top of it all, Wolfe admitted that GirlsDoPorn co-owner Michael James Pratt, 39, whom authorities are still searching for, operated a website called pornwikileaks.com with identifying information and social media accounts for some women being filmed.

          They were ugly, brutal fucks.

          The owners were not convicted because of a contract “trick.” They brutalized 100s of young women in every way possible. Read the DOJ sentencing document for a full picture of what they did.

          • phx@lemmy.world
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            I’d say the condom thing is also because it raises the risk level considerably, not just because it was dishonest. It’s not just the act they didn’t consent to but the risk of unnoticed m unprotected sex.

            BUT, by that token the risk level of having your sex-acts put on the internet for potential millions to see - including family members, potential employers, etc - is still considerable. It can ruin lives in different but still very significant ways.

            These scum deserve to be stuffed in a cell.

          • uranibaba@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Not sure if I would label uploading the videos after saying not to as rape, it feels more along the lines of mental torture but with a better word for it. I guess that rape is a form of torture at the end of day, so still the same?

            Secondly, youre glomming onto one detail and ignoring all the other tactics they used to coerce and rape these woman. They would fly them out to an unfamiliar city for “modeling jobs,” and then demand thousands in payments if they backed out of doing porn. They would sometimes take nudes “for the modeling contract” the threaten to send them to friends/family/etc if they didn’t do porn. Other times, they directly used force and violence, locking them in rooms to kidnap them, or forcing them to do sex acts they dodnt consent at all to, even under duress.

            This is rape.

            • mosiacmango@lemm.ee
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              1 year ago

              The sex trafficers lied about the public uploads, never used the company’s actual name, had fake “previous models” that vouched for the vidoes being private, and even had the cameraman say that he would never shoot “public” porn. They would lie to the models about what was in the contracts, and never gave them copies. They often got them drunk/high before shooting while having them sign releases that said they were not high/drunk. They also specifically targeted 18-20yr olds to make sure the women were as naive as possbile.

              The founder also had a separate website that published some of the victims real names publically.

              Coercing/lying/tricking/forcing someone into a type of sex that they otherwise would not have had willingly is cut and dry rape. These women were sex trafficed, which the DOJ confirmed.