Backpage slaps ‘censored’ label on adult pages ahead of hearings
Backpage.com shuttered its adult pages with a “censored” stamp last night ahead of a hostile U.S. Senate subcommittee hearing today — just hours after a major Supreme Court win ended a lawsuit against the website.
“As the direct result of unconstitutional government censorship, Backpage.com has removed its Adult content section from the highly popular classified website, effective immediately. For years, the legal system protecting freedom of speech prevailed, but new government tactics, including pressuring credit card companies to cease doing business with Backpage, have left the company with no other choice but to remove the content in the United States,” the website said in a statement. “This will not end the fight for online freedom of speech. Backpage.com will continue to pursue its efforts in court to vindicate its First Amendment rights and those of other online platforms for third party expression,” the statement said.
The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations has scheduled a hearing on Backpage.com at 10 a.m. today.
A Senate report released yesterday alleges that Backpage automatically filters out words in online advertising that could indicate that the site was offering sex with children, undermining the company’s free-speech defense that it is simply a host for other ad buyers’ content, and therefore protected under federal law.
The report by U.S. Sens. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) titled “Backpage. com’s knowing facilitation of online sex trafficking,” was released late yesterday ahead of today’s hearing.
Company documents reviewed by Senate investigators “conclusively show that Backpage’s public defense is a fiction,” the report alleges. “Backpage has maintained a practice of altering ads before publication by deleting words, phrases, and images indicative of criminality, including child sex trafficking. Backpage has avoided revealing this information.”
Backpage lawyer Liz McDougall, who is listed as a witness for the hearing, had no comment yesterday. In the past, she has argued that McCaskill and Portman are attacking the wrong people, and that Backpage was a potentially powerful ally to federal and state law enforcement officials trying to crack down on sex trafficking because it is where purveyors place their ads.
The website won a significant U.S. Supreme Court victory yesterday when the high court refused to take up a lawsuit by three women who said they were repeatedly raped as minors after being sold for sex online. A Massachusetts federal judge tossed the case in 2015, and last year the Boston-based 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the decision.
“It is the end of the line for this particular piece of litigation, but it is not the end of the story,” said John Montgomery, an attorney representing the women. “The courts viewed this as a problem for Congress to address, not for the courts, and we will help in any way we can.”