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Update:
- Visa must face charges it knew about child pornography on Pornhub and profited from it amid a lawsuit lodged against the pornography platform and others, a California federal judge ruled.
- On July 17, Plaintiffs Serena Fleites and 33 other unnamed women filed a class action lawsuit against Pornhub’s parent company MindGeek, alleging it profited off videos posted without their consent and often filmed when they were minors.
- On July 29, U.S. District Judge Cormac J. Carney mostly denied Visa’s motion to dismiss the claims lodged against it in the lawsuit, ruling that the plaintiffs have plausibly tied the company to the alleged criminal conspiracy.
- The plaintiffs say Visa was well aware that child pornography existed on the website and provided its services anyway.
- “Visa lent to MindGeek a much-needed tool — its payment network — with the alleged knowledge that there was a wealth of monetized child porn on MindGeek’s websites,” Judge Carney says.
(June 18, 2021)
Pornhub has profited off the videos of 34 women that were posted without their consent and were often filmed when the women were minors, a new lawsuit alleges.
The lawsuit was filed in California on June 17 by Plaintiffs Serena Fleites and 33 other unnamed women.
The lawsuit is the latest filed against Pornhub’s parent company MindGeek this year that allege the company and its affiliates violated federal sex trafficking laws, engaged in the receipt, transport, and distribution of child pornography, racketeering, and more.
According to the lawsuit, 14 of the women were underage when videos of them were filmed, and 14 were the victims of convicted sex criminals
“This is a case about rape, not pornography. It is a case about the rape and sexual exploitation of children,” the claim reads.
“And it is a case about each of these defendants knowingly and intentionally electing to capitalize and profit from the horrendous exploitation and abuse of tens of thousands of other human beings so they could make more than the enormous sums of money they would have otherwise made anyway.”
The claim says that Mindgeek operated like a criminal enterprise “just like the Sopranos.” It adds that the bosses, who engage in “Bro-Culture” have an extreme aversion to visibility and scrutiny, “because the most powerful online pornography company in the world was built and sustained in material parts on child pornography, rape, and human trafficking.”
Fleites says in the lawsuit that a nude, sexually explicit video her high school boyfriend had coerced her to make was uploaded to Pornhub without her knowledge or consent when she was 13 years old.
By the time she discovered the video, it had more than 400 views, and had been widely disseminated throughout her school and neighborhood. Fleites reached out to Pornhub directly and two weeks later the company agreed to take it down.
“Yet another one to two weeks went by before the video was removed from its site. During the months before the video was removed, it was downloaded countless times and reuploaded by different users and with different titles,” the claim states.
One such upload had 2.7 million views. Others had hundreds of comments noting that Serena could not be more than a teenager, the lawsuit states.
“Yet, Pornhub still took weeks to take each video down, each time requiring Serena to provide photographic proof that she was the child depicted in the video before removing it from its site.”
Fleites blames the video, and the bullying and harassment that came with it, for her downward spiral, which included dropping out school, attempting suicide, and getting addicted to drugs.
According to the lawsuit, the defendants created a bustling marketplace for child pornography, rape videos, trafficked videos, and every other form of nonconsensual content.
“They intentionally elected to not employ any effective monitoring of what was being uploaded, or process for removing content that was exploitative and illegal. To the contrary, in the rare instance where the defendants were forced to remove content from their platform, whistleblowers have confirmed that they subsequently would reupload the content to their platform,” the claim alleges.
The lawsuit also names Visa as a defendant, saying that the credit card company was “uniquely suited to stop this exploitation but chose instead to participate in the profiteering.”
“Left devastated were the thousands of human beings who were victimized not simply by their original abuser, but then again, and again, and again by MindGeek’s monetization of that exploitation,” the lawsuit says.
“Plaintiffs in this case are thirty four such human beings victimized first by their original abuser, and then repeatedly by the defendants in this case.”
Pornhub told Spectrum News that it had zero tolerance for illegal content and “investigates any complaint or allegation made about content on our platforms,” adding that it stands “resolutely with all victims of internet-related abuse.”
In a separate lawsuit Pornhub is facing for similar allegations, filed in February, two victims of child sex trafficking are claiming Pornhub enables and promotes sexual abuse of minors. The unidentified female plaintiffs say adults uploaded videos of them being raped underage to the website, where it continues to be viewed, re-traumatizing them with every additional click.
Do you think Pornhub should have to more closely monitor the content posted to its site? Let us know in the comments section!
The women are represented by Michael J. Bowe of Brown Rudnick LLP. They are suing for violations of federal sex trafficking laws, engaged in the receipt, transport, and distribution of child pornography, racketeering, unjust enrichment, and violation of state laws. They are seeking damages, restitution, injunctive relief, legal fees, interest, and a jury trial.
The Pornhub Nonconsensual Videos Class Action Lawsuit is Fleites, et al. v. MindGeek S.A.R.L, et al., Case No. 2:21-cv-04920, in the U.S. District Court Central District of California.
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2 thoughts onVisa lawsuit regarding child pornography profiting avoids dismissal
Yes, Pornhub has a responsibility to monitor what it streams. They have been like an online Walmart where anything goes. This very thing happened to me where an ex had been recording me without my knowledge and we broke up. Weeks later, I heard from various people in my town that they had viewed me on this site. I was shocked and sure enough I was. This is revenge porn. I took it to the local police and they pretty much shrugged their shoulders at me. Small town life for you. Anyway, I had to go through a whole ton of mess and stress to get those stupid videos, pictures, the “about me” that he wrote off. But, not before one video had been downloaded over 1.5 million times. Not cool. That ex is wanted my multiple agencies for arrest. I truly feel for these ladies and Pornhub does a great job at revictimizing the victim who they view as a money maker. They are the online pimps of this century.
Thank you for saving this! You helped me feel less alone. I was trafficked. Hope things get better and keep your chin up, I’m sending good vibes your way