In China, grassroots investigators work to stop illicitly recorded adult content

Open this photo in gallery:People use computers at an internet cafe in Beijing. Pornography is illegal in China, but blocking mainstream websites has created a booming, unregulated black market for stolen and illicit content.Ng Han Guan/The Canadian PressZhou Ninghe was browsing the internet one day when he saw a surveillance video of a changing room, showing several women undressing and showering.At first, he assumed the video was staged, the type of soft-core pornography that can occasionally slip past the automated systems that power much of China’s tough internet controls, before a human censor spots and deletes it. But then he recognized the venue, a popular water park near his home in Fuzhou. A corporate fraud investigator, Mr. Zhou began digging and soon discovered the video was the tip of a sordid iceberg of stolen and illicitly recorded content, much of it traded and sold in private chat groups. Over the next three months, he spent most of his spare time downloading videos and compiling evidence, building around 10 cases with identifiable perpetrators and filing reports with the police, but nothing came of it. “Frustrated by the lack of progress through official channels, I decided to expose the footage publicly online instead,” Mr. Zhou said. “Within a single month of posting, one perpetrator was arrested.” Pornography is illegal in China, with potential prison terms for those found guilty of producing or distributing sexual content for profit. Popular online porn sites, such as those operated by Montreal-based Aylo, are all censored by the Great Firewall. But just as critics of anti-pornography age-verification laws have warned could happen in the West, blocking mainstream websites has created a booming, unregulated black market for both consensual content – like porn produced in Taiwan for the Chinese market – along with stolen intimate videos, illicitly recorded voyeur content and child sex abuse material (CSAM). Last year, the Chinese state-owned Southern Daily reported on a 100,000-user-strong Telegram group named “MaskPark tree hole forum,” in which men shared intimate photos and videos of their partners, along with secretly recorded footage of other women. Similar groups have also been found sharing animal abuse videos and so-called “gore” content. Such networks are not limited to China. CSAM has long been spread via private forums and chat groups, while stories like that of Gisèle Pelicot’s in France have exposed horrifying cases of organized abuse in which videos are created to be shared online. The difference in China is that because all adult content is illegal, users initially seeking consensual material may be more likely to find abuse content. Huang Simin, a Chinese lawyer who specializes in sexual violence cases, said the MaskPark case “heightened the concerns of many women, as voyeuristic incidents seem to be ubiquitous.” “I’ve noticed a general sense of powerlessness,” she said, adding many felt “there’s no effective way to address such incidents.” Grassroots investigators like Mr. Zhou see themselves as one potential solution. Under the moniker “Rat Catcher,” Mr. Zhou has made it his mission to track down such content and bring perpetrators to justice, and he’s already seen tangible results. In February, after being alerted by Mr. Zhou, police in Jinan arrested the alleged ringleaders of a group recording and sharing covert footage from more than a dozen bathhouses and hot springs across China. In May, Mr. Zhou found videos being shared of primary school children in Hunan going to the bathroom; the alleged perpetrators were arrested a month later. Mr. Zhou’s work is not just done online. Many of his most popular videos show him travelling to a hotel or other location where people are being covertly recorded, either to confront the alleged perpetrators or gather evidence. Often, Mr. Zhou will appear in the illicit footage in person, both to confirm where a hidden camera is located and to make himself a victim so he can file a police report. While scammers often threaten to expose illicit videos for blackmail – whether or not they have such footage – Mr. Zhou said it is rare in the cases he tracks. Blackmailing ordinary people brings with it the major risk of being caught for potentially little reward. Instead, the illegal footage itself “functions as a commercial product with layered profit channels,” Mr. Zhou said. Illegal porn sites sell videos for around $7 a clip or access to live feeds of hidden cameras in hotels and changing rooms for considerably more. More often, however, Mr. Zhou said potential customers are encouraged to join private groups, paying a subscription to get access to new videos every day, like an illegal, abusive form of OnlyFans. In January, China criminalized sharing “obscene materials” online, in a broad law apparently targeted at cases like MaskPark but one free speech advocates have warned could criminalize consensual sexting. It followed a ban on installing cameras in hotel rooms, dormitories and restrooms imposed last year. Despite this, Mr. Zhou said legal loopholes remain, and the current system means people sharing videos online may face tougher punishments than those producing them in the first place. Grassroots activism remains key, he said, to stamping out illicit recording. In July, Mr. Zhou quit his job to dedicate himself full time to such work, even as his growing fame – he has more than 100,000 followers on Xiaohongshu, an Instagram-like app – has made it more difficult. “Three separate hotels have outright refused to check me in,” he said. Mr. Zhou has had his government ID, address and cellphone number leaked online by criminals and often receives anonymous threats. “While the harassment is stressful, it does not break my resolve to continue,” Mr. Zhou said. Importantly, he’s seeing results: In the past year, Mr. Zhou said there has been a pronounced drop in the number of videos from hidden cameras in bathhouses and restrooms, something he put down to greater public awareness. “I’ve learned most groups have paused monetization operations,” he said. “They either stopped filming entirely or are holding onto footage without distributing it online – they fear I’ll trace the clips, report them to police and land them in legal trouble, making the risk far outweigh any profit.” With reports from Alexandra Li in Beijing and Reuters