A trial program conducted by Pornhub in collaboration with UK-based child protection organizations aimed to deter users from searching for child abuse material (CSAM) on its website. Whenever CSAM-related terms were searched, a warning message and a chatbot appeared, directing users to support services. The trial reported a significant reduction in CSAM searches and an increase in users seeking help. Despite some limitations in data and complexity, the chatbot showed promise in deterring illegal behavior online. While the trial has ended, the chatbot and warnings remain active on Pornhub’s UK site, with hopes for similar measures across other platforms to create a safer internet environment.
To be fair people are dumb as fuck, don’t search for illegal things on Google or any site that is well known cause that’s how you end up on some watch list.
The original report from the researchers can be found here: https://www.iwf.org.uk/about-us/why-we-exist/our-research/rethink-chatbot-evaluation/ Researchers said:
The chatbot was displayed 2.8 million times between March 2022 and August 2023, resulting in 1,656 requests for more information and Stop It Now services; and 490 click-throughs to the Stop It Now website.
So from 4.4 million banned queries, only 2.8 million (between the date interval in the quote above) and only 490 clicks to seek help. Ngl, kinda underwhelming. And I also think, given the amount of extremely edgy content already on Pornhub, this is kinda sus.
It’s not really that underwhelming. Disclaimer: I don’t condone child abuse. I find it abhorrent, and I will never justify it.
People have fantasies, though. If a dude searches for “burglar breaks in and has sex with milf,” does that mean that he wants to do this in real life? Of course not (or god I hope not!) So, some people may have searched for “dad has sex with young babysitter” and bam! Bot! Some people have a fetish for diapers - there are tons of porn of adults wearing diapers and having sex. Not my thing, but who am I to judge? So again, someone searches “sex with diapers” and bam! Bot!
Let’s not forget that as much as pornhub displays a sign saying “Hey, are you 18?” a lot of people will lie. And those young folks will also search for stupid things.
So I don’t think that aaaaaall 1+ million searches were done by people with actual pedophilia.
The fact that 1,600 people decided to click and inform themselves, in the UK alone, well, that’s a lot, in my opinion, and it should be something to commend, not to just say “eh. Underwhelming.”
Did it? Or did it make them look elsewhere?
The amount of school uniform, braces, pigtails and step-sister porn on Pornhub makes me think they want the nonces to watch.
given the amount of extremely edgy content already on Pornhub, this is kinda sus
Yeah…i am honestly curious what these search terms were, how many of those were ACTUALLY looking for CP. And of those…how many are now flagged somewhow?
I know I got the warning when I searched for young gymnast or something like that cuz I was trying to find a specific video I had seen before. False positives can be annoying, but that’s the only time I’ve ever encountered it.
I kind of want to trigger it to see what searches it reacts to, but at the same time I don’t want my IP address on a watchlist.
And what days were those? Cuz you pretty much need to go all the way back to pre-internet days. Hell, even that isn’t far enough, cuz Playboy’s youngest model was like 12 at one point.
4.4 million sounds a bit excessive. Facebook marketplace intercepted my search for “unwanted gift” once and insisted I seek help. These things have a lot of false positives.
Probably just looking for deals on new stuff that people dont care about having been gifted.
I could definitely see “unwanted gift” being a code word for trafficking :(
Do you really think human traffickers are listing people under secret codes on accounts obviously linked to their real identity with their real face? Remember the ikea thing where vendors who didn’t specify a price received an absurd default price for their goods eg 9999.99 and people that furniture that was listed at that price corresponded to kids being sold?
Not necessarily trafficking, but could be trafficking-adjacent.
There used to be “child rehoming” ‘services’ on Facebook and the like, for people who regret adopting a kid, and pass them to others. Here’s a fairly in-depth article on the whole affair. Unsurprisingly, it didn’t go well.
EDIT: In hindsight, “unwanted gift” could also be about people getting unexpectedly pregnant, and putting the resulting child up for adoption, but not wanting to go through legal means for one reason or another, which seems a more likely answer.
