A sex trafficking victim has filed a lawsuit against Twitter in a U.S. district court in California, alleging that the social media giant knowingly received and distributed child pornography.
According to the court filing, John Doe said he was solicited and recruited for sex trafficking as a minor. After his escape, material depicting his abuse was disseminated on Twitter.
“When Twitter was first alerted to this fact and John Doe’s age, Twitter refused to remove the illegal material and instead continued to promote and profit from the sexual abuse of this child,” the plaintiffs allege.
John Doe and his parent contacted Twitter multiple times about the content, but Twitter allegedly didn’t suspend the accounts distributing those materials until a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agent intervened.