A senior executive at the parent company of Canada-based adult video provider Pornhub has appeared in a video acknowledging potential security vulnerabilities on the website that could be exploited by criminals. He also indicated that the company’s top management is aware of these concerns but has not taken steps to address them.
In the video, he refers to what he calls a “loophole” in Pornhub’s age and consent verification process. This loophole pertains to the company’s lack of identity verification for videos where individuals don’t display their faces.
He emphasized the difficulty in confirming the identity of individuals in a video when their faces aren’t visible, underscoring the challenges in matching them with the actual content uploader’s identity.
“How are you going to tell me who’s in that video if the girl’s not showing her face?” Mr. Farley told the undercover journalist.
When questioned about the possibility of criminals and rapists exploiting this loophole, Mr. Farley responded in the affirmative, saying, “Of course.”
When asked whether human traffickers could take advantage of the loophole, he replied, “To make money? Of course.”
While Pornhub permits consenting adults to post videos of themselves engaged in pornographic content, the identity verification loopholes described by Mr. Farley create opportunities for criminals to upload videos of non-consenting victims of sexual exploitation who may not have their faces visible in the videos, thus evading scrutiny.
Mr. Farley also reported that when he raised concerns about the loophole with the company’s senior management, including the chief product manager (CPO) and chief legal officer (CLO), he received comparable responses disregarding the issue.
“We’ve brought it up to the CPO, we’ve brought it up to to the CLO, and they’re both telling us it’s all good,” he said.
Mr. Farley’s LinkedIn profile indicated over a decade of service at MindGeek, encompassing various roles. His LinkedIn profile was removed following the publication of Sound Investigations’ video on Sept. 13.
The Epoch Times reached out to Mr. Farley for comment but did not receive a response by publication time.
Accusations
Pornhub, a Montreal-based company established in 2004, is one of the most-visited websites globally and ranks number one for most visited pornographic websites, according to Similarweb, an internet traffic analysis firm.“In many cases, the survivors told the Committee that Pornhub only removed their content in response to legal threats, police reports or indications that the victim was considering suicide. Some videos garnered hundreds of thousands or millions of views before being removed,” the report said.
Despite previous scrutiny by the Canadian government, Mr. Farley asserts that government regulators may not possess the ability or qualifications to detect Pornhub’s verification loophole.
“[The government] already did their investigation. They were satisfied,” he told the undercover reporter. “They technically checked and said that it’s all good. So they can’t really go back on that.”
The interview with Mr. Farley is the first of a six-part undercover investigation carried out by Sound Investigations from June through July. Ms. Young told The Epoch Times via email that they will be releasing videos of interviews with other employees from Pornhub, MindGeek, and Aylo in the coming weeks.
