Crime Enslaved on OnlyFans: Women describe lives of isolation, torment and sexual servitude

[Nizam al-Mulk]

I'm pretty sure in ancient Rome and in ancient Greece, courtesans and hetairas were "fancy and respected" towards the decline of their respective civilizations.

Japanese and Chinese societies have been up and down as much as a roller coaster. And they usually had concubines, not likely lovers. Slightly different status.

Care to elaborate on the first paragraph.

How different?

 

[fungi]

Care to elaborate on the first paragraph.

How different?

First or second?

 

[Cooz]

In at least one case, Reuters found, a woman’s ordeal allegedly began after the new rule was adopted. The woman, from Arkansas, told police that beginning in 2023, her boyfriend terrorized her and forced her to film sex videos for OnlyFans for hours on end, and if she resisted he “would physically attack her,” according to an arrest affidavit filed by a police detective in the city of Van Buren. Reuters couldn’t determine if she’d signed a consent form.

The man, Michael Hall, has pleaded not guilty to trafficking and is awaiting trial. His lawyer didn’t respond to requests for comment.

OnlyFans was not the only platform cited in these cases. But its popularity and generous terms make it potentially lucrative. Creators on the site collect 80% of the revenue their accounts generate. OnlyFans gets the rest.

Websites accused of hosting sex trafficking face legal risks. At least a dozen lawsuits have been filed under U.S. federal anti-trafficking statutes against social media companies and other sites since 2019, accusing them of profiting from sexually abusive content. The companies have said they’re shielded from civil and criminal liability by a federal law designed to safeguard free speech, but Congress has passed legislation in recent years to chip away at those protections.

Two pending sex-trafficking lawsuits name OnlyFans as a defendant. One accuses the company of profiting from the exploitation of two women in Nevada by a former reality TV personality. The other, detailed in a Reuters investigation in March, involved a Florida college student who claimed OnlyFans profited from video of her alleged rape posted on the site.

A judge has recommended that OnlyFans be dropped from the Florida case because of free speech protections – prompting pushback from the woman’s attorneys. In both cases, the company denies it violated sex-trafficking laws.

TATE ‘CARBON COPY’

Andrew Tate, a hyper-macho social media phenomenon and self-professed misogynist, gained international attention after being implicated in a sex-trafficking scheme that allegedly used OnlyFans to rake in money.

Prosecutors in Romania say Tate and his brother Tristan, both former kickboxers with U.S. and British citizenship, lured seven women with promises of romance, forced them to perform sex acts on OnlyFans, and then pocketed the profits. Tate once described the platform as “the greatest hustle in the world.”

The brothers were charged in June 2023 with human trafficking and forming a gang to sexually exploit women; Andrew Tate was also charged with rape. They deny the allegations and await trial in Bucharest. In November, an appeals court ordered that some evidence be removed from the case due to legal flaws.

Andrew Tate is still under house arrest pending a second investigation into human trafficking in which prosecutors say he also used OnlyFans. No charges have been filed in that probe. The Tates’ lawyer couldn’t be reached for comment.

The high-profile cases underscored concerns among online safety groups about the potential for exploiting women on OnlyFans. And, according to prosecutors, the Tates have spawned Romanian imitators.

In June 2023, Vlad Obuzic and three other men were arrested in what a source at Romania’s anti-organized crime prosecuting unit, or DIICOT, told Reuters was “a carbon copy of the Tate model.”

Prosecutors said the men also used false romantic promises, threats and violence to make the women create porn for an adult platform, which the DIICOT source identified as OnlyFans. Some women were forced to tattoo the suspects’ names or faces on their bodies, or words such as “toy” or “dog,” according to a filing by the judge summarizing the charges.

“The victims were gradually brought to a position of inferiority, mental dependence and obedience,” said the filing, which described Obuzic’s ability to “identify vulnerable people and exploit their need for affection, trust and stability.”

Obuzic has described the Tates in online videos as mentors and “very good friends.” He offered his own online “playboy” guide in which he boasted of having “more hoes in the trenches. Onlyfans, webcam. Numerous girls with my portrait tatted on their skin.”

Prosecutors said Obuzic’s 18-month operation began in 2021 and involved seven women. They said he and his “soldiers” made the equivalent of $2.6 million from posting the women’s content on OnlyFans and “kept almost all the money.”

The men were indicted in October 2023 on charges of human trafficking and forming an organized crime group. They have denied the charges. Their trial is pending. “Prosecutors must prove the accusations,” said Dumitru Badragan, Obuzic’s lawyer. Lawyers for his co-defendants could not be reached.

Prosecutors believe Tate and Obuzic made their millions exploiting dozens of women. The suspected trafficking operations Reuters identified in the U.S. feature fewer victims and less money. But they show how OnlyFans has given people new routes into trafficking, according to prosecutors, allowing men and women to hide sexual abuse while profiting from it.

Full read:
https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/onlyfans-sex-trafficking/

@Sinister - Can you fix the bold?

OnlyFans gives women the chance to earn money by making porn. Sex traffickers also use the platform to abuse and exploit them, say police and prosecutors. The accused range from social media influencers to cash-hungry boyfriends. “I don’t think I’ll ever be fully healed,” said one victim.

By LINDA SO, ANDREW R.C. MARSHALL, LUIZA ILIE and JASON SZEP
This story contains offensive language and descriptions of sexual abuse.
On an August morning in 2022, a young woman slipped out of a house in suburban Wisconsin and dashed to a waiting police car.

Her hands shaking, she told officers it was the “most brave thing I’ve ever done in my life.”

For nearly two years, her boyfriend had held her captive, prosecutors say. She feared he’d kill her if she tried to leave. But just days earlier, after he’d poured hot grease down her back, she started plotting her escape, secretly messaging family and friends to alert police.

The young woman later explained her desperation to detectives: Almost every night, her boyfriend had forced her to record sex acts on camera to sell online. Among his chosen outlets was OnlyFans, the hugely successful website famous for porn.

OnlyFans says it empowers content creators, particularly women, to monetize sexually explicit images and videos in a safe online environment. But a Reuters investigation found women who said they had been deceived, drugged, terrorized and sexually enslaved to make money from the site. The findings are based on redacted U.S. police complaints and international court files, lawsuits and interviews with prosecutors, sex-trafficking investigators and women who say they’ve been trafficked.

In one prominent case, influencer Andrew Tate, with millions of followers worldwide on social media, is accused of forcing women in Romania to produce porn for OnlyFans and pocketing the profits. He has denied the charges.

Generating less attention are cases Reuters identified in the U.S., where some women endured weeks or months of alleged sexual slavery in ordinary-looking homes in quiet communities. The victim sometimes was a fiance or girlfriend, abused to pad the household budget, fund a couple’s retirement or cover children’s expenses, according to accounts in police or court files. Reuters is withholding the names of women who say they have been trafficked.

The woman from Wisconsin, now 23, was abused by Austin Koeckeritz, who described himself on a blog as “a business owner, an artist, and a student of psychology.” He’s serving a 20-year prison sentence after pleading guilty to sex trafficking.

“The two years there felt like decades, and I was in pain and alone and ready to die,” the woman said in her first public comments about the case. “I don’t think I’ll ever be fully healed.”

At least two cases detailed in police files involve allegations of forced prostitution. A husband and wife ran a six-state trafficking and prostitution operation before their arrest in a tidy Ohio neighborhood where they were raising two children, prosecutors say. The husband allegedly used OnlyFans to arrange sexual encounters for multiple women and sell porn he ordered them to make. He awaits trial; his wife recently pleaded guilty to related charges.

These trafficking enterprises relied on intimidation, violence or false assurances of love to press women into porn and keep them producing, say victims and prosecutors. The alleged perpetrators were mostly men – some accused of beating and raping women, others of tattooing their names and faces on their victims. They filmed in private settings, sometimes holding victims captive for a year or more, the records and interviews show.

In a note she hid in the front yard for police the day before they rescued her, the Wisconsin woman said she “was basically imprisoned in this room to keep making money” for her abuser.

On OnlyFans, sex traffickers have a “unique niche” in which to privately conduct their business, said Catheline Torres with the U.S.-based National Human Trafficking Hotline, which helps survivors of trafficking and exploitation. Reuters identified 11 cases of women who told authorities or filed lawsuits saying they had been forced to perform sex acts on OnlyFans. But experts including Torres say the true prevalence of sex trafficking on the platform is nearly impossible for outsiders to assess. The accounts of most content creators are hidden behind a subscription-based paywall, “minimizing the likelihood that they are caught and prosecuted,” Torres said.

Prosecution can also be difficult because fearful or traumatized victims are reluctant to speak up or testify in court.

One woman told a detective her fiance had forced her over months to produce porn for OnlyFans in a suburban trailer park outside Orlando, Florida. She only escaped, she said, because police showed up to arrest the fiance on an unrelated warrant last year. He was charged with human trafficking in her case. But she recanted her allegations months later, and prosecutors dropped the charge.

She told Reuters that she feared the case might affect her custody of the couple’s young son and still felt “sick” just talking about what happened. “It brings back all the feelings, the emotions – every time,” she said. “The damage is forever.”

OnlyFans did not respond to requests for comment. The company is not charged in any of the cases described in this story.

On its website, OnlyFans says it prohibits prostitution and “modern slavery,” which includes human trafficking and forced labor. It says its moderators review all content on the site and are trained to identify and report suspected trafficking. OnlyFans has led “a focus on safety for people in the adult content space,” CEO Keily Blair said during a panel discussion in March.

Under company rules, creators must have written consent from everyone in their content. But until November 2022, they didn’t have to show that proof of consent to OnlyFans before the platform allowed their content to be posted, according to Blair’s recent statements to a UK parliamentary committee. The company now checks for proof of consent before allowing content to go live, she said.

Are you copy pasting the text and inserting your own lego images?

 

[Nizam al-Mulk]

First or second?

Both.

Pretty sure Scythians and the Vikings were wife swapping in their prime.

 

[fungi]

Both.

Pretty sure Scythians and the Vikings were wife swapping in their prime.

Ok. I'll elborate on concubines in the Far East.
They had higher status than lovers. They were closer to second, third, forth, etc. wives. It was possible for children from a concubine to become heirs.

 

[Osculater]

It's just pimps pimping their hoes in da internet instead on the streets

 

[KnightTemplar]

show us the keywords for these legos?

Rule 34: no exceptions.

 

[KnightTemplar]

Well the other side has to be pretty damn bad. So bad that people feel desperate enough to give away reason and support a con man.

I blame the Democrats for Trump more than the Republicans because I expect the Republicans to support a vile person, but the Democrats, the ones who pretend at least to want to do what's right for American citizens have not been doing that since before Clinton.

This has led to a desperate state where profoundly dangerous con man and villains can arise like Trump.

Dems have to learn: if they want to beat someone like Trump, don't put up a woman as candidate. They're 0 - 2 with that DEI shit.

 

[Nizam al-Mulk]

Ok. I'll elborate on concubines in the Far East.
They had higher status than lovers. They were closer to second, third, forth, etc. wives. It was possible for children from a concubine to become heirs.

If a local community introduced that in lets say Texas i doubt they would be seen as different status.

 

[KnightTemplar]

Jesus dude get some help

This has nothing to do with Trump

There is no help for TDS. Liberals will be screeching like this for the next four years.

 

[fungi]

If a local community introduced that in lets say Texas i doubt they would be seen as different status.

Either way, it's a fucked up "tradition".
Pretty abusive to women, and not good for society in general.

 

[Nizam al-Mulk]

Either way, it's a fucked up "tradition".
Pretty abusive to women, and not good for society in general.

Abusive compared to what? Women not being able to have bank accounts in the 50s?

Why should i not look at hoes hoing as fairly neutral?

 

[ObsoleteSoul]

Pron and sex work have always been abusive to women.
Whoever thinks it's a good "career" is beyond naive.

It’s abusive to all involved. Women have it worse, but, I truly see porn as a horrible thing all together. It warps everyone who partakes in it, in at least some small negative way. Some obviously more than others.

 

[fungi]

Abusive compared to what? Women not being able to have bank accounts in the 50s?

Why should i not look at hoes hoing as fairly neutral?

Why should you look at hoes with judgment?
Why look at hoes at all?
Who are you to pass judment upon anybody?

P.s. Where in the world are women not able to have bank account in their 50s?

 

[fungi]

It’s abusive to all involved. Women have it worse, but, I truly see porn as a horrible thing all together. It warps everyone who partakes in it, in at least some fl negative way. Dole obviously more than others.

Pron has now had ruined several generations of humans, both those who make it and who consume it, imho.

It affects everything: sexual expectations, interpersonal relationships, treatment of women especially, marriages, etc.

I truly think that the globalists have been using it as a tool to break down core family units, and to eventually depopulate the planet.

Spoiler

I do have my hat on.

 

[Nizam al-Mulk]

Why should you look at hoes with judgment?
Why look at hoes at all?
Who are you to pass judment upon anybody?

P.s. Where in the world are women not able to have bank account in their 50s?

I am law abiding enough to post on sherdog therefore i can pass judgement.

United Sates in certain cases unrelated to income.

 

[ObsoleteSoul]

Pron has now had ruined several generations of humans, both those who make it and who consume it, imho.

It affects everything: sexual expectations, interpersonal relationships, treatment of women especially, marriages, etc.

I truly think that the globalists have been using it as a tool to break down core family units, and to eventually depopulate the planet.

Spoiler

I do have my hat on.

Not sure about the last point, but i agree with all the rest.

 

[fungi]

I am law abiding enough to post on sherdog therefore i can pass judgement.

United Sates in certain cases unrelated to income.

Do what you will.

In the US they can age & sex discriminate?
On what basis?

 

[Nizam al-Mulk]

Do what you will.

In the US they can age & sex discriminate?
On what basis?

I said 50s, before the civil right act of 63.

 

[fungi]

I said 50s, before the civil right act of 63.

Oh, I must've misread that post.

Still better than Iraq where they want to legalize marrying 9-y.o. girls.

Or Afghanistan where women are not allowed to converse with anyone outside their direct family.

And so on and so forth.