SAN DIEGO—Aylo, the parent company of tube sites such as Pornhub and YouPorn, on Tuesday was sued by 61 women who were victimized by the GirlsDoPorn sex trafficking ring.
The suit filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California alleges Aylo and its associated companies engaged in human trafficking and racketeering. It seeks damages and restitution of more than $311 million—or about $5 million per victim named in the suit.
The alleged victims are represented by personal injury attorney, Brian Holm, and the Holm Law Group, who are demanding a jury trial.
A spokesperson for Aylo told AVN that the company will not comment on ongoing litigation.
“We look forward to the facts being fully and fairly aired in that forum,” the Aylo spokesperson said. “The safety of our community is our number one priority, so we are proud to have instituted Trust and Safety policies that surpass those of any other major user-generated platform on the internet. Our compliance program has helped us set the standard for the tech industry, and we are committed to remaining at the forefront of this important area.”
Holm filed civil suits on behalf of other victims in 2016 to 2018 cases, leading to indictments of the owner of GirlsDoPorn, Michael Pratt, and others. The most recent indictment was Douglas Wiederhold, founder and co-owner of MomPOV.com with Pratt.
Most of the women who appeared in GirlsDoPorn videos were fraudulently misled by Pratt and his associates who said that the “modeling” gigs they advertised on Craigslist and other job boards would only be distributed as DVD releases in foreign media markets.
According to the complaint, Pornhub and its sister tube sites entered into a content partnership with GirlsDoPorn and MomPOV. The suit alleges that MindGeek (Aylo’s former name) executives at the time either knew of the illegal activity at Pratt’s operation or didn’t vet the premium sites and their parent companies further.
The suit claims that Aylo is liable for enabling Pratt’s criminal enterprise and capitalizing off of marketing videos that feature the victims across the Pornhub network.
The lawsuit additionally mentions a series of investigative videos published by Sound Investigations alleging executives at Pornhub’s parent company dismissed a “predator loophole.” According to the complaint, content moderation was conducted by a single person, who was expected to vet 700,000 videos flagged on the platform. In addition, the flagging program that was in place at the time required a minimum of 15 flags in order to qualify for moderation and review by the woefully short-handed trust and safety team that Aylo had in its employ, according to the complaint.
The timeline of events described in the lawsuit appears to be before Aylo rebranded and Ethical Capital Partners acquired the company.
Another Jane Doe victim, formerly known as Kristy Althaus, also has filed suit against Aylo with similar claims.
