Craigslist Says Adult Ads Gone For Good

From PC World: Pressured by law enforcement, advocacy groups, and Congress the popular site Craigslist said it would permanently remove adult services from its online classified ads here in the United States. The move has been lauded by foes of Craigslist's adult services ads, but it has also sparked concern among free-speech advocates who see the shuttering of its adult services as a threat to free speech on the Internet.

Craigslist's lawyers told a House Judiciary subcommittee hearing on child sex trafficking Wednesday that it has no plans to reopen its U.S. adult services section, which it shut down September 3 after heavy criticism from human rights advocacy groups and Congress who charged that Craigslist was commonly used in the global sex trade of women.

William Clinton Powell, the director of customer service and law enforcement relations for Craigslist, said that his company had "no intention to bring the category back" and "money is not a consideration." Craigslist skirted the issue of whether it would yield to calls by advocacy groups to stop running erotic services ads that appear on international versions of the Craigslist site outside the U.S.

Of course, shutting down Craigslist's Adult Services section for good is unlikely to fix all the sex trafficking issues like that. As Elizabeth McDougall, a partner at Perkins Coie LLP (the law firm representing Craigslist), says, the ads will just "migrate to less socially responsible sites" that won't cooperate with law enforcement.

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