Instagram has removed Pornhub’s account from its platform.
Prior to its removal, the Canadian-owned pornographic video-streaming website had more than 13 million followers on Instagram and had shared more than 6,200 posts.
It’s unclear when exactly the Meta-owned social media giant took down the popular adult entertainment site, but on Friday afternoon the founder and CEO of the nonprofit Justice Defense Fund, Laila Mickelwait, tweeted that the account “was just taken down.”
“Instagram has made the right decision by cutting ties with Pornhub, and now joins Visa, Mastercard, Discover, PayPal, Grant Thornton, Heinz, Unilever, Roku and many other companies in rejecting to do business with Pornhub, a site infamous for monetizing the sex trafficking and criminal sexual abuse of countless victims including children,” Mickelwait told the Daily News in an email Saturday.
“It is worth remembering that it’s illegal in the United States according to the Trafficking Victim’s Protection Act to knowingly benefit from a sex trafficking venture,” she added, urging other companies to do the same. “Now, it’s finally time for Google search, Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure and Reflected Networks to follow suit.”
Instagram’s parent company, Meta, didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
The National Center on Sexual Exploitation, a nonprofit that focuses on “exposing the links between all forms of sexual abuse and exploitation,” applauded Instagram’s move, saying that the decision indicates that the platform “understands the mounting evidence of Pornhub’s criminality.”
“Instagram was right to remove Pornhub from its platform for violating its community standards given the increasing reports of Pornhub hosting child sexual abuse material, sex trafficking, filmed rape, and non-consensual videos and images. Instagram served as a distribution partner with this criminal enterprise, helping to push millions to their website, including children,” the group’s CEO, Dawn Hawkins, said in a statement Saturday.
“We are grateful that Instagram has heard the voices of sexual abuse survivors who have been personally harmed by Pornhub’s insatiable appetite for profit,” Hawkins added.
Pornhub didn’t share pornographic videos or images on Instagram, but according to the NCOSE, the account “directly promoted pornography, and featured videos like ‘Next Career Goal’ encouraging its audience to become a pornography performer.”
“Instagram is courageously choosing to stop partnering with Pornhub and it is time for all corporate entities to follow its example,” Hawkins said.
Last month, both Visa and Mastercard announced that they were suspending payment privileges of TrafficJunky, the advertising arm of Pornhub’s parent company MindGeek, Variety reported.
