Four years after SESTA/FOSTA, a new bill investigates its harm
Four years ago, Congress voted almost unanimously in favor of legislation that was intended to snuff out online sex trafficking, in the aftermath of charges against classified ads site Backpage. The bill, which introduced civil and criminal liability for websites that promoted sex trafficking, was also perceived as a measure of accountability for tech platforms amid heightened scrutiny of Big Tech.
But SESTA/FOSTA, as the bill came to be known, has turned out to be a case study in how complicated it is to regulate the internet—and what happens when lawmakers pass sweeping legislation without considering who might pay the price. Since SESTA/FOSTA was written broadly, rather than targeting specific sites, it effectively took aim at Section 230, a piece of legislation that was foundational to the internet and gives platforms legal cover for user-generated content. When the law was passed, Craigslist took down its personals site and Reddit scrubbed a number of subreddits, while many smaller sites shut down altogether to protect against the ramifications of unintentionally hosting illegal content; companies like Google reportedly started removing Google Drive files from specific users.
Sex workers have shouldered much of the fallout from the legislation, navigating how to work without risking legal culpability, all while losing access to community and the digital spaces that allowed them to do their jobs more safely. The internet had empowered many sex workers to set their hours and vet clients more easily, leaving them less vulnerable to physical violence. This week, on the fourth anniversary of the passage of SESTA/FOSTA, a new bill—which was just reintroduced by Congress, sponsored by Senator Elizabeth Warren and Representative Ro Khanna—seeks to do something quietly radical: to investigate the effects of the previous legislation and give voice to the sex workers whose lives have been changed by SESTA/FESTA.
During SESTA/FOSTA negotiations, Congress heard from victims of sex trafficking. But sex workers didn’t have enough of a voice at the federal level—and still don’t, according to sex worker rights advocate Kate D’Adamo. “Sex worker advocacy is hyper localized and deeply unfunded,” says D’Adamo, a partner at Reframe Health and Justice and one of the advocates spearheading the new bill. “That also means there’s no one meeting with staffers at the federal level. There’s no one commenting about how this is going to impact sex workers. So that really put us at a disadvantage.”
Over the last four years, D’Adamo says that has started to change, as advocates have talked to sex workers following SESTA/FOSTA and elevated their experiences. One of the more robust studies was the Erased report from sex worker collective Hacking//Hustling, which surveyed more than 130 sex workers through online and street-based outreach. The SAFE SEX Workers Study Act, which grew out of conversations with staffers on the Hill, would build on that kind of outreach by conducting a national study that examines the impact of SESTA/FOSTA on sex workers. “This is really about trying to make sure we’re doing the most robust data collection that’s possible, and that means we have to do national studies,” D’Adamo says. “We’re sex worker organizers, and we have our limitations, too. Who are the communities that we are failing to capture because we don’t have those relationships?”
The bill offers a unique opportunity for advocates like D’Adamo to educate members of Congress on sex work and center the experiences of sex workers as they try to drum up support, which wasn’t the case during negotiations over SESTA/FOSTA. “We’re typing out handwritten emails to every single staffer,” she says. “As challenging as that is—it would be great to have a lobby—that also means we can have one on one, really intimate conversations that aren’t scripted with staffers.” Many of her conversations so far have found a receptive audience, D’Adamo says, though she admits it’s hard to draw attention to the issue at the moment. “There are a lot of things happening in the world right now,” she adds. “It doesn’t often make it to the top of the pile. But the support conceptually is usually really, really positive.”
If adopted, the SAFE SEX Workers Study Act would also be the rare bill that acknowledges the effects of misguided legislation, particularly in the realm of regulating digital spaces. “I have such a well of gratitude for the folks who are willing to do that,” D’Adamo says of the bill’s sponsors and supporters. “I think that represents the best that Congress can be—the willingness to say: ‘We did a thing. Now let’s look at what happened, and let’s try to do better.’”
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