LOS ANGELES—Aylo, the parent company of Pornhub.com, has reached a combined agreement in two 2021 class action lawsuits brought by sex-trafficking survivors allegedly exploited as minors in video content distributed on the Canadian company's many platforms.
The complaints were initially filed in federal district courts in California and Alabama, and came as a direct result of the highly controversial "Children of Pornhub" investigative commentary written by Nicholas Kristof in December 2020 for the New York Times opinion section.
According to a motion for preliminary approval filed in a federal district court late Friday, attorneys for the plaintiffs have asked U.S. District Judge Wesley Hsu of the Central District of California to give an initial approval for establishing a settlement fund of $120 million for class action members.
If approved by the court, the settlement will benefit a victim class of individuals who were under 18 years of age when they were depicted in child sexual abuse material and other online exploitation that was uploaded and made viewable on Aylo-owned websites between February 12, 2011 and December 6, 2024. After a preliminary approval of the motion, Judge Hsu would schedule a final approval hearing in court within 96 days of issuing the order adopting the motion. In the time prior to that final approval hearing, any of the class member can file objections to any component of the settlement proposal.
“Behind the legal standards and docket entries in this motion are thousands of children whose sexual exploitation was recorded and uploaded to [the] defendants’ pornography websites by third parties and distributed by [the] defendants across the world," the motion reads. "Their videos and images were viewed over 684 million times on Pornhub.com and [the] defendants’ other websites, some of the most visited websites on Earth."
Other elements of the settlement include an overhaul of Aylo’s trust and safety practices, which have been made a central focus upon the acquisition of Pornhub.com and its other sites and studios by the private equity firm Ethical Capital Partners.
Actions outlined by the settlement include efforts to verify the ages of all users who want to upload content and people who appear in content. This includes an overhaul to record-keeping policies for content creators, porn producers and adult studios.
Aylo, known as MindGeek at the time of the lawsuits, has adopted many stipulations in the proposed settlement as standard policy.
For example, all content creators involved in Pornhub's model programs have to upload identity verification documents. And online content partner account holders, typically studios and producers, must pass criminal background checks to monetize content.
Aylo additionally began reporting to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) in the years since the Kristof column. NCMEC reporting is in the proposed settlement of the class actions.
An Aylo spokesperson declined to comment on the proposed settlement citing ongoing litigation.