For Immediate Release:
September 29, 2023
For press inquiries only, contact:
Amanda Priest (334) 322-5694
Cameron Mixon (334) 242-7491
(Montgomery) – Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall joined 23 other states in a letter to Pornhub’s parent company with concerns over content featuring children. The letter comes after an employee for the company was apparently captured on video by an undercover journalist discussing Pornhub’s moderation practices and discussing a “loophole.” According to the employee, when users upload content to the site, they are required to submit a photo ID, but are not required to show his or her face in the material uploaded. The employee states there is no way to confirm the person uploading the photo ID is the same person in the content. When asked if rapists and human traffickers use this loophole to upload content of their victims to make money, he replies, “Of course.”
The Attorneys General, in their letter, state, “As you are aware, various Federal and state laws forbid the creation and distribution of CSAM (Child Sexual Abuse Material). We are concerned that Aylo and its subsidiary Pornhub, and possibly other subsidiaries, may be proliferating the production and dissemination of CSAM through the ‘loophole’ identified by your employee. Please provide us with an explanation of this ‘loophole;’ whether Aylo and its subsidiaries do, in fact, permit content creators and performers to obscure their faces in uploaded content; and, if so, whether Aylo is taking measures to change this policy to ensure that no children or other victims are being abused for profit on any of its platforms.”
Alabama is joined by Alaska, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia, and Wyoming on the South Carolina-led letter.
View the full letter here.
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