YouTube has banned the official Pornhub account, which boasted more than 900,000 followers, after repeated violations.
The platform’s move comes in the wake of other Big Tech companies, like Meta/Instagram and TikTok, removing such accounts. Other corporations, like Visa, Mastercard, Roku, Comcast, Unilever, Kraft-Heinz, and PayPal, have also cut ties with Pornhub.
“Upon review, we terminated the channel Pornhub Official following multiple violations of our Community Guidelines,” YouTube spokesperson Jack Malon said, according to Variety. “We enforce our policies equally for everyone, and channels that repeatedly violate or are dedicated to violative content are terminated.”
MindGeek, Pornhub’s parent company, has been hit with multiple lawsuits from survivors of child sex trafficking who claim videos of their abuse were platformed on the pornographic site.
Traffickinghub movement founder Laila Mickelwait on Friday celebrated the ban and called on Twitter to “follow suit.”
BREAKING: Pornhub’s 900k+ follower YouTube account has been shut down after extensive evidence of Pornhub’s involvement child sexual abuse and trafficking.
TikTok and Meta/Instagram have also shut down Pornhub’s accounts… Twitter should follow suit. #Traffickinghub
— Laila Mickelwait (@LailaMickelwait) December 17, 2022
Mickelwait’s movement describes itself as “individuals, survivors, organizations and advocates from across a broad spectrum of political, faith and non-faith, economic, and ideological backgrounds, all uniting together for the single purpose of shutting down Pornhub and holding its executives accountable for enabling, distributing and profiting from rape, child abuse, sex trafficking and criminal image based sexual abuse.”
Nonprofit group National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCSE) cheered the ban, too.
“Pornhub has lost yet another means to market and profit from exploitation, and we are grateful to YouTube for removing the account of this predatory enterprise,” NCSE’s Lina Nealon said in a statement. “Pornhub was driving people directly to their pornography site – a violation of YouTube’s policies — which mounting evidence shows is rife with child sexual abuse material, sex trafficking, rape, and image-based sexual abuse.”
MindGeek has responded to its boot from YouTube by framing it as an attack on “sex workers.”
“Pornhub maintains the absolute best trust and safety measures on the internet and takes special care to ensure it does not violate any of YouTube’s Community Guidelines,” a statement from the company said. “Unfortunately, this is just the latest example of discrimination against those in the adult industry, a trend seen across social media and all other facets of life, especially as groups disingenuously conflate consensual adult content with exploitation.”