#956 - Laila Mickelwait - How Pornhub Became The Internet’s Biggest Crime Scene

Pornhub: A Crime Scene Hiding in Plain Sight

1. The Main Idea in a Nutshell

   • Pornhub wasn't just a porn site; it was a platform that knowingly hosted and made money from millions of illegal videos of rape and child abuse, until a massive public movement exposed them.

2. The Key Takeaways

   • Anyone Could Upload Anything: It took less than 10 minutes and only an email address to upload a video. The site didn't check IDs to make sure people were adults or check if everyone in the video actually agreed to be filmed.
   • A Massive Scale of Crime: The site was "infested" with real crimes. At one point, it would have taken you 169 years to watch all the videos uploaded in a single year. Fact: After being exposed, Pornhub was forced to delete 91% of its entire website, which was over 50 million videos.
   • Victims Were Ignored: Victims who found videos of themselves and begged for them to be taken down were usually ignored. The site had a backlog of over 700,000 flagged videos being reviewed by just one person.
   • The Bosses Knew: Internal company emails, which were accidentally leaked by a court, proved that Pornhub's executives knew for years that their site was full of illegal content but did nothing because they were making so much money.
   • People Power Worked: A movement started with the hashtag #Traffickinghub got 2.3 million petition signatures. This pressure convinced credit card companies like Visa and Mastercard to cut ties with Pornhub, which was the final blow that forced them to take down the illegal content.

3. Important Quotes, Explained

• Quote: "> My abuser put me in a mental prison, but Pornhub gave me a life sentence."

  • What it Means: The original abuse was a horrible, traumatic event. But having a video of that abuse posted online forever, where anyone can download and re-share it, is a never-ending torture that the victim can never escape.
  • Why it Matters: This shows the devastating, lifelong harm that happens when a company hosts this kind of content. It’s not just "pixels on a screen"; it's a permanent public record of someone's worst moment.

• Quote: "> Pornhub is not a porn site, it's a crime scene."

  • What it Means: The speaker is saying the website was much more than just a place for adult videos. It was a platform where real, serious crimes were being committed, shared, and profited from on a global scale.
  • Why it Matters: This one sentence completely changes how you think about the issue. It shifts the conversation from a debate about pornography to a clear-cut case of a company enabling and making money from criminal activity.

4. The Main Arguments (The "Why")

   1. First, the speaker argues that Pornhub's entire business was built on a dangerously broken system. By allowing anyone to upload videos without checking for age or consent, they created a perfect place for criminals to post videos of their crimes.
   2. Next, she provides evidence that Pornhub knew about the illegal content but intentionally looked the other way. She points to internal documents, a tiny moderation team (just 10 people per shift for millions of videos), and policies that made it almost impossible for victims to get help.
   3. Finally, she points out that Pornhub wasn't just a neutral platform. They were actively involved by promoting illegal content in search results, copying videos to their other websites, and even offering tools that helped uploaders stay anonymous, making it harder for police to catch them.

5. Questions to Make You Think

   • Q: Why couldn't Pornhub just use the law to say they weren't responsible for what users uploaded?
   • A: The text explains they tried to use a law called Section 230, which often protects websites from what their users post. But judges said no. That's because Pornhub wasn't neutral; they were actively involved in promoting and curating the content, like making thumbnails and recommending illegal videos.
   • Q: How did they finally get Pornhub to delete so many videos?
   • A: The key was going after their money. The Traffickinghub movement created so much public pressure that major credit card companies like Visa and Mastercard stopped allowing payments on Pornhub. Since the site needed credit cards to be profitable, they were forced to delete all their "unverified" content to try and win the credit card companies back.
   • Q: Are other porn sites doing the same thing?
   • A: The text says yes, many other big porn sites operate the same way, and many are even owned by the same parent company. However, the fight against Pornhub is acting as a warning shot, scaring other sites into cleaning up their act because they're afraid they'll be sued next.

6. Why This Matters & What's Next

   • Why You Should Care: This story is a huge deal because it shows how things can go horribly wrong on the internet when big companies put profits ahead of people's safety. It's a powerful lesson that online actions have severe, real-world consequences for victims, and it proves that ordinary people can stand up to a massive corporation and force it to change.
   • Learn More: To understand the human side of this story, check out the New York Times article by Nicholas Kristof called "The Children of Pornhub." It's a tough read, but it's the article that helped expose this whole scandal to the world.