New ‘child-sex’ sites replace Backpage

The FBI’s closure of the sleazy classified-ad site Backpage.com hasn’t made it any harder to buy and sell sex online — it has just given rise to other fleshpeddling Web marketplaces, according to cops and johns.

“For the social-mediasavvy degenerate, there was no lapse” after Back- page.com went kaput last month, a law-enforcement source told The Post.

Several copycat sites saw huge spikes in traffic since the site’s April 6 closure.

Bedpage.com, for example, which shows up in search engines as “Bedpage: Site similar to backpage” and appears to be hosted in Canada, has rocketed up the online charts since April, according to traffic-statistic site Alexa.

The feds seized and closed Backpage because it was being used by sex traffickers, often to sell underage victims — but experts say the criminals have just moved on.

“I think anyone who said Backpage shutting down would make a real impact on commercial sexual exploitation and sexual exploitation and trafficking was naive at best,” said Rachel Lloyd, the founder and executive director of the anti-sex-trafficking group Girls Educational & Mentoring Service.

The NYPD is continuing to set up stings with bogus ads on the alternative sites, just as it did on Backpage, according to sources.

But a john told The Post, “Marijuana’s legal, gambling’s legal — why don’t they make [prostitution] legal? They would make money on it, and they would be able to control who the girls are.”