The PayPal online payment service is no longer allowing referrals to make money on Pornhub, as the porn platform posted in a blog post. "We are shocked by PayPal's decision to stop paying out to over one hundred thousand artists who depend on them for their livelihood," the statement said.
The actors and performers must now switch to other payment options such as direct transfer or the crypto currency Verge. If you are still waiting for outstanding PayPal payments from October, you should contact directly Pornhub.
"Payments will be shipped by the end of this week," the company said. "We sincerely apologize if this causes delays." In social networks, sufferers like a Los Angeles sex worker now complain about the late payments: "Damn, some of us really counted on this money."
Apparently actors from Pornhubs "Model Program" are affected - here they can upload their own videos and earn money. And more than just Peanuts: "The program, packed with over 100,000 performers, has opened up a whole new source of revenue for influencers who are a bit different from influencers on Instagram or Snapchat," the Forbes report said 10th anniversary of the program last year. "These influencers have earned millions of dollars and billions of video views on a website that reaches over 100 million visitors daily."
"Discrimination and stigmatization of sex workers"
In its Terms of Use, PayPal excludes money transfers for "certain sexually-targeted products and services." It is unclear, however, why the company has not previously taken action against Pornhub payments.
A PayPal spokesperson said "Vice" only, "After reviewing, we found that Pornhub made certain business payments through PayPal without obtaining our consent, and we've taken action to prevent these transactions from happening."
A Pornhub spokesman described the move as discriminatory: "Decisions like those made by PayPal and other large corporations only hurt efforts to stop discrimination and stigmatization of sex workers and sex workers." The list of payment service providers, apps and banks that explicitly exclude pornography from their services is long and includes Stripe, Venmo, Visa and Mastercard, Citi Bank and Bank of America.
In the future, the company wants to experiment with other "sex worker-friendly" payment options such as cryptocurrencies. However, in the past year, according to Coindesk, less than one percent of users paid by cryptocurrency.