TikTok accused of funnelling teenage girls to OnlyFans, research finds
TikTok has been accused of promoting OnlyFans to young women and teenage girls. A recently published report claims that some of the platform's content creators are subtly encouraging young women to move to OnlyFans, a platform for selling adult content.
Researchers from the UK's CESE (Centre to End All Sexual Exploitation) and Australia's Collective Shout jointly conducted the research, titled 'TikTok-to-OnlyFans Pipeline'. Over several months they watched posts by creators of sexual content and followed the content TikTok's algorithm recommended to them.
Naming OnlyFans directly on TikTok, or posting a link to the platform, is banned. But such accounts often use emoji, coded words and indecent gestures to hint at adult content for sale elsewhere.
The research looked at how hints of adult content are hidden in viral TikTok videos. In many of these videos, creators post 'get ready with me' (GRWM) style content — filming themselves getting dressed and made up while preparing to go somewhere or do something.
A report in The Guardian said that to evade TikTok's content moderation, some people write 'corn' instead of 'porn'. Others use a corn emoji together with a star emoji.
In some viral posts, OnlyFans creators told their followers how much money they had earned by selling sexual content. The adult platform was presented there as a way out of poverty and unemployment — as if it were a story of becoming rich overnight from a poor situation.
The research report said: 'One of the most promoted messages in these posts is that selling sexual services on OnlyFans brings a luxurious life. A life with freedom, joy, friendship and plenty of money.'
A TikTok spokesperson said about the report: 'Sharing or displaying sexual content on TikTok is strictly prohibited. We use advanced technology to enforce our community guidelines. Our systems are also designed so that age-inappropriate content does not reach teenagers.'
Last month, a report by US broadcaster NPR cited depositions given in a federal court in March 2026. Those depositions showed that TikTok employees had repeatedly warned the company's management about serious risks to children's safety. Inside the company, they raised concerns about suicide-related content and the risk of sexual exploitation of minors.
The employees alleged that viewers were given the chance to watch live broadcasts featuring minors in exchange for money. The company earned revenue from such 'transaction-based sexual content'. They expressed concern that this could also expose TikTok to the risk of potential financial crime.
The company had also rejected a proposal to run a survey to verify users' ages. The reason was that the results of such a survey would have had to be presented to the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC).
