Why Is Meta Trying to Link OnlyFans to Sex Trafficking?

Instagram users who follow OnlyFans news on the Meta-owned platform may have noticed something unusual when they enter OnlyFans-related queries into the search bar. Where the platform used to be a reliable source for OnlyFans news, now users are presented with a warning that the content they’re trying to search could be related to sex trafficking or prostitution. There’s a button that prompts users to “get help,” with little workaround available to continue on to search for news. 

Meta’s original platform, Facebook, doesn’t seem to be issuing the same warning when prompted to do OnlyFans-related searches, but Threads users have also found that they can’t conduct OnlyFans searches without a warning popping up. Meta has a history of suppressing OnlyFans creators and OnlyFans-related content, so why is their largest platform showing OnlyFans news while linking OnlyFans to sex trafficking on their other platforms? 

OnlyFans creators use a variety of different social media channels to promote their monetized platforms, and direct potential subscribers to their OnlyFans profiles. With Instagram being a platform that is based on image sharing, it’s been a key traffic-driver for models who need a way to reach a wider audience that might not be aware of their presence on OnlyFans. Models who use Instagram are always cautious to only share content that is within Meta’s TOS, and yet OnlyFans creators are consistently targeted and banned from the platform for violating those same TOS that they follow to the letter. 

U.K. based OnlyFans star, Lily Phillips, recently lost the Instagram account that she’d been building since before becoming an OnlyFans creator. The account was taken down in May, and while it was restored, Phillips says that this is a common occurrence for creators like her. Said Phillips, "We're really being discriminated against. All my content is always in the guidelines. I really don't even show my ass cheeks or anything like that. I'm pretty strict." 

Instagram has faced widespread criticism for the way the platform has suddenly suspended creator accounts. In April, Instagram’s chief executive, Adam Mosseri, said, “We don't allow nudity, for instance, and we don't allow solicitation, so they might be unfortunately tripping up some of those rules,” and now users who search for OnlyFans-specific news receive the warning that their search activity might be related to sex trafficking. 

In contrast, across all of Meta’s platforms, paid promotional content that features images that should directly violate Meta’s nudity rules is pushed to user feeds. On the one hand, Meta is indiscriminately removing adult content creators who are legally creating and sharing adult content on a platform that is securely paywalled, and when pressed for the reason why, says that these models are sharing nudity or soliciting. On the other hand, Meta is taking money from advertisers and showing users the same kind of content that they’re implying these creators are showing on Instagram. 

OnlyFans has strict policies surrounding both age-verification and consent that result in creator accounts being banned if they aren’t followed to the letter, making Meta’s claims that users are engaging in sex-trafficking-related activity simply for searching for OnlyFans-related content seem flimsy at best, and discriminatory against digital sex workers at worst. The continued presence of ads that feature the exact same kind of content that Meta has banned OnlyFans creators for allegedly featuring on their channels suggests that the concern about sex trafficking is a smokescreen for Meta continuing to engage in practices that allow them to suppress content that encourages users to leave the platform and give their attention to something else.