OnlyFans has gained recent popularity during the COVID-19 pandemic as a social platform that allows creators to monetize their content and creates connections between creators and fans. The site has been praised by many as a way to legitimize consensual, self-identifying, sex work with a more ethical business structure than competing platforms, like PornHub. While OnlyFans has had good media coverage for its role in allowing creators to get paid directly for their explicit content, the reality is that OnlyFans is just one more platform that allows and encourages sexual exploitation of the most vulnerable in society.
OnlyFans presents unique challenges for law enforcement in stopping trafficking because of the paywall it uses, which restricts access to content, requiring an upfront subscription or payment. OnlyFans’ paywall would require that law enforcement investigate every OnlyFans account individually unless there are already other indicators of third-party control or trafficking. Further, while the platform’s goal is to give content creators autonomy in how they monetize their content, the reality is that the economic devastation of the pandemic encouraged many already trafficked victims to start OnlyFans accounts as a means to pay for basic human needs like electricity, food, water, etc. The economic instability that the pandemic created also allowed OnlyFans to serve as an on-ramp into the life based on the clear indicators of third-party control and trafficking on the site.
The Avery Center did a case study on the presence of trafficking on the platform and the unique ways in which OnlyFans allows for sex traffickers and buyers to exploit victims of sex trafficking. The Center’s study is reported with criminal displacement theory in mind, which assumes that where crime is being targeted in one area, it simply moves – and the same true for the buying of sex when the pandemic first began. The sheltering in place mandates created the perfect storm for OnlyFans to gain popularity and traffickers to expand their reach.
The Avery Center’s report found several ways that OnlyFans is changing the trafficking landscape. The platform has become a standard way that buyers ‘screen’ for opportunities to meet ‘creators’ for in-person sex which has created the buying of more in-person sex. While some victims used OnlyFans as a way to get out of the sex trade, most were unsuccessful in their attempts to exit the life. The instability of the pandemic and the paywall increased the supply of individuals selling in-person sex. Apart from the paywall posing challenges for law enforcement, it also allows for financial abuse from sex buyers because OnlyFans has customer guarantee policies that protect consumers over creators. Overall, the platform makes it difficult for consumers to determine whether creators are consensually engaging in sexual acts and creates more opportunities for buyers to purchase in-person sex, while maintaining economic instability of victims that reinforces the cycles of trafficking.
Things You Can Do
- If you are a consumer on OnlyFans, keep the Avery Center’s key indicators of 3rd party control in mind and report any activity that appears to be controlled by someone other than the creator. The identified indicators are:
- High volume content
- Professional content on OnlyFans while posting unrelated activities on social media
- Using language and hashtags associated with trafficking
- Photos and tags of traffickers on social media pages
- Traffickers actively promoting the creator’s content on their social sites
- Listen to survivors when you see topics surrounding legalizing or legitimizing sex as work come up in conversation or in the media.
- Read the CSE Institute’s previous blog on OnlyFans and their reversal of the decision to ban explicit content.
This piece is part of our first-year law student blog series. Congratulations to author Taylor Wilson on being chosen!
All views expressed herein are personal to the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law or of Villanova University.