Teh One Who Knocks
03-06-2020, 11:01 AM
By Sam Dorman | Fox News
https://i.imgur.com/gVDGA8B.jpg
An anti-PornHub petition with the goal of shutting down the adult video giant and holding its executives accountable for allegedly facilitating human trafficking has acquired nearly 370,000 signatures.
The petition is addressed to U.S. and Canadian officials and targets the CEO and COO of MindGeek, which owns PornHub. Anti-trafficking activist Laila Mickelwait started the petition, claiming that PornHub makes it too easy for sex traffickers to feature victims in videos uploaded to the site.
As of Thursday, the petition had more than 367,000 signatures.
"They're set up for exploitation," Mickelwait told Fox News in an interview, adding that she plans to formally notify the Trump administration of the petition.
The petition points to several instances of trafficked victims appearing on pornographic sites, including an underage girl who was missing for nearly a year before her mother learned that 60 pornographic videos of her had been posted to PornHub, SnapChat, Periscope, and ModelHub. As Mickelwait noted on Twitter, PornHub described the girl as a "verified model with valid ID."
"Pornhub is generating millions in advertising and membership revenue with 42 billion visits and 6 million videos uploaded per year," the petition reads. "Yet it has no system in place to verify reliably the age or consent of those featured in the pornographic content it hosts and profits from."
"In fact," the petition goes on, "all that is needed to upload pornography onto Pornhub is an email address. No government-issued ID is required, not even to become “verified” with its trusty blue checkmark that makes everything seem a-OK."
Mickelwait added that PornHub also does not have any "reliable system in place to verify that those in the videos it hosts are not trafficked children being raped on film in order to line the pockets of its executives."
MindGeek did not respond to Fox News' request for comment.
The video-sharing site reported that it garnered 42 billion visits -- or an average of 115 million visits per day -- in 2019. In addition, a record 6.83 million videos were uploaded to the site last year.
"To put this in perspective – if you strung all of 2019’s new video content together and started watching them way back in 1850, you’d still be watching them today!" Pornhub says.
Mickelwait's organization started a website called TraffickingHub.com, mocking the video giant, and is promoting a protest at PornHub's Montreal headquarters on March 8, International Women's Day.
The petition was addressed to several U.S. senators, including Sens. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., and Rob Portman, R-Ohio, who have previously sponsored anti-sex trafficking legislation.
“Any person or company responsible for human trafficking or facilitating it, especially the sexual exploitation and abuse of children, should be punished to the full extent of the law," Rubio said in a statement provided to Fox News. "I will work with my colleagues to close any archaic loophole in Federal law that allows anybody to escape prosecution.”
Portman told Fox News that he would "continue to work to ensure that no more men, women, or children fall victim to this terrible crime.” His legislation, titled the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act, became law in 2018 and outlaws companies from knowingly assisting or facilitating sex trafficking.
The Justice Department declined to comment. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-Calif., Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., have backed legislation that would study the effects of Portman's bill. The bill is viewed by its sponsor, Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., as a step towards legalizing sex work.
According to Khanna's office, the law has forced sex workers off of online platforms and into more dangerous situations. "Sex workers have relied on such internet platforms to screen clients and negotiate boundaries for consensual, transactional sex services, including condom use and other harm reduction strategies," Khanna said in a press release in December.
It's unclear how Khanna's legislation would impact PornHub.
Mickelwait's petition was also addressed to Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., who recently introduced legislation to reauthorize a comprehensive study on human trafficking.
“At any moment there could be thousands if not hundreds of thousands of individuals being trafficked in the United States, but we have no way of knowing just how widespread this horrific crime really is," Hawley said in a statement provided to Fox News.
Hawley added: "If we’re going to make effective policy decisions around this, we have to get the data necessary to understand just how pervasive it is – both in our communities and online. That’s why I’ve introduced a bill to commission the first comprehensive federal study on human trafficking in more than a decade. This is a major step in moving the ball forward, so we can help victims and put criminals behind bars.”
https://i.imgur.com/gVDGA8B.jpg
An anti-PornHub petition with the goal of shutting down the adult video giant and holding its executives accountable for allegedly facilitating human trafficking has acquired nearly 370,000 signatures.
The petition is addressed to U.S. and Canadian officials and targets the CEO and COO of MindGeek, which owns PornHub. Anti-trafficking activist Laila Mickelwait started the petition, claiming that PornHub makes it too easy for sex traffickers to feature victims in videos uploaded to the site.
As of Thursday, the petition had more than 367,000 signatures.
"They're set up for exploitation," Mickelwait told Fox News in an interview, adding that she plans to formally notify the Trump administration of the petition.
The petition points to several instances of trafficked victims appearing on pornographic sites, including an underage girl who was missing for nearly a year before her mother learned that 60 pornographic videos of her had been posted to PornHub, SnapChat, Periscope, and ModelHub. As Mickelwait noted on Twitter, PornHub described the girl as a "verified model with valid ID."
"Pornhub is generating millions in advertising and membership revenue with 42 billion visits and 6 million videos uploaded per year," the petition reads. "Yet it has no system in place to verify reliably the age or consent of those featured in the pornographic content it hosts and profits from."
"In fact," the petition goes on, "all that is needed to upload pornography onto Pornhub is an email address. No government-issued ID is required, not even to become “verified” with its trusty blue checkmark that makes everything seem a-OK."
Mickelwait added that PornHub also does not have any "reliable system in place to verify that those in the videos it hosts are not trafficked children being raped on film in order to line the pockets of its executives."
MindGeek did not respond to Fox News' request for comment.
The video-sharing site reported that it garnered 42 billion visits -- or an average of 115 million visits per day -- in 2019. In addition, a record 6.83 million videos were uploaded to the site last year.
"To put this in perspective – if you strung all of 2019’s new video content together and started watching them way back in 1850, you’d still be watching them today!" Pornhub says.
Mickelwait's organization started a website called TraffickingHub.com, mocking the video giant, and is promoting a protest at PornHub's Montreal headquarters on March 8, International Women's Day.
The petition was addressed to several U.S. senators, including Sens. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., and Rob Portman, R-Ohio, who have previously sponsored anti-sex trafficking legislation.
“Any person or company responsible for human trafficking or facilitating it, especially the sexual exploitation and abuse of children, should be punished to the full extent of the law," Rubio said in a statement provided to Fox News. "I will work with my colleagues to close any archaic loophole in Federal law that allows anybody to escape prosecution.”
Portman told Fox News that he would "continue to work to ensure that no more men, women, or children fall victim to this terrible crime.” His legislation, titled the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act, became law in 2018 and outlaws companies from knowingly assisting or facilitating sex trafficking.
The Justice Department declined to comment. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-Calif., Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., have backed legislation that would study the effects of Portman's bill. The bill is viewed by its sponsor, Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., as a step towards legalizing sex work.
According to Khanna's office, the law has forced sex workers off of online platforms and into more dangerous situations. "Sex workers have relied on such internet platforms to screen clients and negotiate boundaries for consensual, transactional sex services, including condom use and other harm reduction strategies," Khanna said in a press release in December.
It's unclear how Khanna's legislation would impact PornHub.
Mickelwait's petition was also addressed to Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., who recently introduced legislation to reauthorize a comprehensive study on human trafficking.
“At any moment there could be thousands if not hundreds of thousands of individuals being trafficked in the United States, but we have no way of knowing just how widespread this horrific crime really is," Hawley said in a statement provided to Fox News.
Hawley added: "If we’re going to make effective policy decisions around this, we have to get the data necessary to understand just how pervasive it is – both in our communities and online. That’s why I’ve introduced a bill to commission the first comprehensive federal study on human trafficking in more than a decade. This is a major step in moving the ball forward, so we can help victims and put criminals behind bars.”