The Scarlet RT: How WePay Denies Service to Sex Workers & Surveils Everyone

Friday night I was home on a date with myself, my cat, and Hannibal when sex work twitter started showing up en masse around a sister and porn performer, Eden Alexander.

Eden was gravely ill, couldn’t work, was struggling with the cascade of expenses following a medical emergency. Her friends in the sex worker community setup an online fundraiser for her, using the site GiveForward. They knew online services often deny service to sex workers. They were upset, but not surprised, when supporters’ donations were returned, and when WePay – GiveForward’s payment processor – shut down the fundraiser.

Got this email from @wepay saying they CANCELLED my medical fundraiser bc ill use the money for porn. LITERALLY. pic.twitter.com/Sa8tohWaDe

— Eden Alexander (@EdenAlexanderXX) May 17, 2014

That was Saturday afternoon on the East Coast. By dinner, after almost twenty-four hours of Eden’s supporters filling WePay’s @’s on twitter, they responded. This is the part that raised a red red flag for me:

WePay is extremely empathetic to what Eden Alexander is facing and her hardship is unfathomable.  We are truly sorry that the rules around payment processing are limiting and force us to make tough decisions.

So:

When @WePay laments the rules that “force them to make tough decisions,” they do mean their own rules. http://t.co/cYrPa0izn0 — Melissa Gira Grant (@melissagira) May 17, 2014

At this point, WePay’s co-founder and CEO Bill Clerico turned up. You can watch Bill here in 2009, explaining that WePay’s origins were in a difficult situation he and his buddies had, splitting the bill for a bachelor party (at the 57 second mark): Bill maybe didn’t anticipate the actual workers in that biz he was so moved by to demand service from him. But he was direct, and at least answered some questions. (Phase two of social media blowup: “transparency!”)

@melissagira @WePay no, we mean the rules set by banks, visa & MasterCard

— Bill Clerico (@billclerico) May 17, 2014

@melissagira @WePay she retweeted it

— Bill Clerico (@billclerico) May 17, 2014

This is not a RT so according to @WePay, it’s not an endorsement. pic.twitter.com/kLmyvhDn5w

— Melissa Gira Grant (@melissagira) May 17, 2014

.@billclerico @WePay she wasn’t using your service to fund or offer adult material. How does at RT violate your TOS?

— Melissa Gira Grant (@melissagira) May 17, 2014

.@billclerico @WePay this was a fundraiser clearly meant for medical expenses. Did you reach out to Eden before pulling it to advise her?

— Melissa Gira Grant (@melissagira) May 17, 2014

.@billclerico @WePay how did you find out the fundraiser was connected to porn? You pay staff to look at “porn RT’s” but won’t accept the $?

— Melissa Gira Grant (@melissagira) May 17, 2014

@melissagira @WePay correct, we are required to monitor customer websites and social media. Bc we have to, not bc we want to

— Bill Clerico (@billclerico) May 17, 2014

That is, according to their co-founder and CEO, WePay is “forced” and “required” not just to deny service, but also to monitor their customers’ activities on WePay and on the rest of the internet.

Who are these people forcing you, WePay? And what are they requiring you to monitor that you don’t want to?

.@billclerico @WePay what do you monitor your customers’ outside content looking for? Did your bank provide you a list? Up to yr discretion?

— Melissa Gira Grant (@melissagira) May 17, 2014

@melissagira @WePay there are certain things (like selling adult content) that we can’t process for. We build detection for that

— Bill Clerico (@billclerico) May 17, 2014

@helenaimeej @melissagira @WePay we monitor what we can. It’s not a perfect science

— Bill Clerico (@billclerico) May 17, 2014

@ClangingBells @melissagira @WePay it is. It’s a combination of software and manual review

— Bill Clerico (@billclerico) May 17, 2014

@MsMaggieMayhem @WePay all

— Bill Clerico (@billclerico) May 17, 2014

To recap so far: WePay’s CEO claims that some outside guidelines require WePay to deny service to anyone linked remotely to providing “adult content” (for which a legal definition, btw, doesn’t exist), and by “linked” they mean a RT potentially, and this is of such risky business it requires them to monitor not just all suspected sex workers but all their users. Who set these guidelines?

@melissagira @WePay we have our own procedures and policies that are based on our obligations under or bank contracts & visa/mc rules

— Bill Clerico (@billclerico) May 17, 2014

@zeynep @jilliancyork @melissagira @MsMaggieMayhem @WePay it’s not law, it’s bank & card network policy

— Bill Clerico (@billclerico) May 17, 2014

Right:

.@billclerico @WePay so your own procedures and polices, informed by banks, exercised w/ your discretion, led to denying Eden’s fundraiser.

— Melissa Gira Grant (@melissagira) May 17, 2014

 

To sum up: @WePay‘s @billclerico says they surveil all their users’ online content, not just sex workers, so that solves that.

— Melissa Gira Grant (@melissagira) May 17, 2014

And: as @WePay monitors all of your online activity, that means you can be denied service based on what you RT. Or link.

— Melissa Gira Grant (@melissagira) May 17, 2014

Eden’s supporters have created a new fundraiser for her. Right now she’s raised over $6500 in less than 24 hours.

Final thoughts?

While @WePay spun all this as “listening to criticism,” that they responded at all is rare. Public outcry supporting sex workers is rare.

— Melissa Gira Grant (@melissagira) May 18, 2014

By standing up for @edenalexanderxx against @WePay,we all proved that sex workers are not a group who can be abused without consequence

— Molly Crabapple (@mollycrabapple) May 18, 2014

All of these Silicon Valley rich white men are going to save the world AND profit with their revolutionary apps for everyone. </sarcasm>

— Maggie Mayhem (@MsMaggieMayhem) May 17, 2014

So appreciate you All trying to help me. Ill get back to you all as soon as I’m strong enough again. Very overwhelmed right now.

— Eden Alexander (@EdenAlexanderXX) May 18, 2014

(•_•) <) )╯sex workers / \ \(•_•) ( (> are / \ (•_•) <) )> people / \

— sarah jeong (@sarahjeong) May 18, 2014