WASHINGTON—The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has filed a complaint against Mastercard with the Federal Trade Commission. Filed with a slate of sex workers’ rights groups, the ACLU accuses Mastercard of discriminating against sex workers online amid the aftermath of FOSTA-SESTA and a consistent campaign against the industry by far-right religious groups.
“Adult content is constitutionally protected speech under the First Amendment,” reads a press statement issued by LaLa Holston-Zannell, the organization’s Trans Justice Campaign manager. “As our complaint explains, Mastercard’s vague and ambiguous policy requirements, coupled with the dangerous combination of platform over-compliance and inadequate automated tools, has led to the vast censorship of this entirely lawful category of speech.”
In its press statement, the ACLU profiled adult performer and trans sex worker Vanniall, who explained that she had been victimized by Mastercard and the institutional banking system after the credit card processor issued new guidelines for payment processing on adult entertainment websites.
New York Times opinion contributor Nicholas Kristof can be partially linked to the changes that companies like Mastercard imposed on platforms like OnlyFans, Pornhub and membership sites.
Kristof, a staunch critic of the adult industry, authored a widely-criticized commentary piece titled “The Children of Pornhub.” The inflammatory column accused Pornhub’s parent company, MindGeek (rebranded as Aylo under Ottawa-based private equity firm Ethical Capital Partners), of monetizing videos that depict minors being sexually assaulted. These videos have since been removed, but Kristof’s column sparked a moral panic and gave brand new fervor to the far-right anti-pornography movement. Organizations such as the National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCOSE) pounced on the opportunity to push Mastercard to block transactions from websites like Pornhub. The center has claimed responsibility, among others, for this mass panic campaign.
For Vanniall, the impact was personally damaging. “These biometrics have to be taken multiple, multiple times,” Vanniall said in the ACLU’s statement. “I’m talking to multiple dark-skinned people who have had this same problem.” The Mastercard payment policy is presented by the ACLU as “yet another barrier needlessly put between sex workers, their rights, and their safety.”
Groups that have signed the complaint to the Federal Trade Commission with the ACLU include NGOs and collectives such as Woodhull Freedom Foundation, Bay Area Worker Support, Best Practices Policy Project, BIPOC Adult Industry Collective, the Center for HIV Law and Policy, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Equity Strippers NoHo, and other organizations.
