Pornhub $120 million settlement on track for approval

The settlement with women who had nonconsensual content posted of them while underage requires the porn site verify people shown in videos uploaded to the site as well as the users who upload them are over 18.LOS ANGELES (CN) — A federal judge on Friday preliminary approved a $120 million class action settlement on behalf of thousands of women who had explicit sexual images of them uploaded to Pornhub that were created when they were underage.U.S. District Judge Wesley Hsu issued a tentative ruling, which wasn’t made publicly available, in which he agreed to the settlement. Attorneys for the plaintiffs and for the owner of Pornhub submitted to the judge’s tentative during a brief hearing in downtown Los Angeles.The settlement resolves two class actions, one filed in Alabama and one in California, that accuse MindGeek — as the owner of Pornhub and related websites was called until 2023 — of violating the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act by financially benefiting from child sexual abuse material that users posted on its sites.In many cases, underage women had videos of them engaging in explicit sexual conduct uploaded to Pornhub without their knowledge and consent by their former boyfriends. The lead plaintiff in the Alabama class action claims she was 16 years old when she was drugged and raped by a man who uploaded the video he made of the assault to Pornhub.The plaintiffs claim that for years MindGeek took almost no action, refusing to so much as institute any semblance of an age-verification or other policy that would prevent the uploading child sexual abuse material.The settlement, filed Aug. 14 in Los Angeles federal court, covers anyone who was younger than 18 when they were depicted in explicit sexual content and this depiction was made viewable on MindGeek’s websites between Feb. 12, 2011, and Dec. 6, 2024.MindGeek, now called Aylo, also agreed to require government issued identification to verify that anyone who is depicted in videos, as well as the users who upload them, is over 18. The Montreal-based company also committed to using extensive content moderation to remove child sexual abuse material and to expand procedures to handle content removal requests.Pornhub had 1 billion monthly visitors as of 2013, according to media reports.A group of 15 women have opted out of the class action to pursue their individual child trafficking lawsuits against MindGeek, as well as against the company’s financial backers and payment facilitators.One of them — the only one who didn’t sue anonymously and who was featured in 2020 New York Times expose of child porn on Pornhub — said in her complaint that she was just 13 when her then-boyfriend coerced her in making a sexually explicit video.She then learned that the boyfriend had uploaded the video on Pornhub where it immediately went viral and was viewed by students at her school and others in her community.The individual plaintiffs’ cases are still pending before Hsu.The judge, a Joe Biden appointee, last year rejected MindGeek’s argument that it was immune from the women’s claims under Section 230 of Communication Decency Act, which shields websites from liability over the content its users post.Although MindGeek’s attorney argued at the time that Pornhub is no different than other porn sites that have had similar claims dismissed, the judge observed that the women in the lawsuits specifically accuse the site’s moderators of helping users post child pornography and making it easy for other users to find.Section 230, the judge observed, is a robust protection for online platforms against third-party malfeasance.“It is not intended to protect MindGeek from its own malfeasance,” Hsu said. “That is what is alleged here.”Subscribe to our free newslettersOur weekly newsletter Closing Arguments offers the latest about ongoing trials, major litigation and rulings in courthouses around the U.S. and the world, while the monthly Under the Lights dishes the legal dirt from Hollywood, sports, Big Tech and the arts.Additional Reads