A protester in Thailand after the porn site was banned in the country last month
Pornhub no longer makes it possible for everyone to download videos. Also, only verified accounts are allowed to upload videos to the platform in the new year. These steps come after criticism in response to an article by The New York Times. The newspaper wrote last weekend that there are many videos on the porn site with rapes and child pornography.
Pornhub is like YouTube for the porn industry. Viewers can put their videos on the platform themselves. Much of the 6.8 million videos that end up on the platform every year were probably made with the consent of the adult actors, but some include footage of child pornography and rape.
Since it is difficult to determine whether a juvenile person in a video is 14 or 18 years old, no one knows exactly which part of the videos are illegal. Unlike on YouTube, the videos were until recently downloadable by users. Thus, this makes the deleted rape videos available to users, who could repost the videos on the platform.
Now it is only possible for paying users to download videos. Uploading is only possible by partners of the website and persons who generate advertising income via the website.
Research
According to The New York Times, Pornhub makes money from the illegal videos through advertisements. Pornhub contradicts that. But credit card companies Visa and Mastercard have decided to further investigate their relationship with the porn site. If it is found that Pornhub is breaking the law, they will no longer cooperate with the site. Last year, Unilever decided to stop advertising after a fuss about a campaign by a subsidiary on the site.
NOS Stories made a special about revenge porn in the Netherlands last year. It showed that every year hundreds of people report intimate images that end up unsolicited on porn sites, such as on Pornhub.
