OnlyFans CEO says it is 'truly the safest and most inclusive social media platform' after claims that child abuse images originated on the site

• BBC Newsnight reported that child abuse images found on other websites originated on OnlyFans.
• OnlyFans said the BBC had prevented it from investigating because it didn't hand over evidence.

The CEO of OnlyFans said it was the "safest" and "most inclusive" social media platform after BBC Newsnight reported that illegal content found online had originated on the site.

A US investigator interviewed by the BBC said they found 10 child abuse images, including one of a five-year-old child and others aged about 12, on other sites, all of which they said had originally been created on OnlyFans. The images were found in about an hour, according to the investigator, who was not identified by the BBC.

Amrapali Gan, CEO of OnlyFans, told the BBC: "We actively work with law enforcement. If anyone makes the mistake thinking they can upload illegal content, we will report them. We're truly the safest and most inclusive social media platform."

OnlyFans told Insider in a statement: "When the BBC raised this anonymous claim, we asked them for evidence to enable us to investigate, determine if it was true, and to take appropriate action to protect people online. The BBC refused to provide any details or evidence preventing OnlyFans from investigating this claim."

The BBC did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

The investigator used by Newsnight believed the images were created in the past six months and had OnlyFans watermarks. They also said there were "still cracks" in the platform's moderation of illegal content that meant it was "still slipping through."

Four in five OnlyFans employees work on content moderation, Gan said, per the report. The chief strategy officer of OnlyFans, Keily Blair, told the BBC it had "invested significantly" in improving its tools for verifying age and identity and that it did more than other social media sites to prevent underage use.

"One of the issues that was raised was being able to pass off the account that you've opened to somebody else – that's not now possible," Blair said.

Simon Bailey, director of strategic engagement at the Child Rescue Coalition, told the BBC that its investigation last year found children had appeared in and sold videos on OnlyFans. However, a new leadership team was now in place and had taken action, he said.

"They are monitoring everything through AI and human moderation, making sure abuses are not taking place," Bailey said.

Ofcom, the UK's communications watchdog, said in a report in October it was "encouraged" to see measures the OnlyFans had put in place to tackle child abuse content: "Ofcom is pleased to see a VSP [vertical service provider] taking steps to implement age verification processes that appear more robust than the traditional and much more prevalent self-declaration of date of birth."

Tim Stokely stepped down as CEO of OnlyFans in December 2021 and was replaced by Gan. The British businessman founded the platform in 2016 before selling it to Ukrainian-American entrepreneur Leonid Radvinsky two years later.

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Radvinsky has since received dividends of more than $500 million from OnlyFans in less than two years as users flocked to the platform during the pandemic.