The dissemination of pornographic content filmed without victims’ knowledge is a growing problem in China, with many hotels having hidden cameras and videos being distributed on Telegram.
One night in 2023, Eric (not his real name) was browsing a social media channel that he used to access to consume pornography when, a few seconds after starting a video, he froze.
Eric realized that the couple he was observing was himself and his girlfriendEmily (also fictitious name). Three weeks earlier, they had spent the night in a hotel in Shenzhen, southern China, unaware that they were not alone.
The couple’s most intimate moments had been captured by a hidden camera in the hotel room, and the images were made available to thousands of strangers who accessed the same channel that Eric used to watch pornography.
Eric is no longer just a consumer of the Chinese hidden camera porn industry and became a victim.
The call “hidden cam porn” has existed in China for at least a decade, despite the production and distribution of pornography being illegal in the country.
Even with bans in China, in recent years, the topic of “hidden cameras” has started to appear frequently on social media, with people — especially women — exchanging tips on how to identify chambers the size of a pencil eraser. Some even set up tents inside hotel rooms to avoid being filmed.
Last April, the Chinese government implemented new rules to try to contain the problem, requiring hotel owners regularly check the presence of hidden cameras.
Much of this material is published on the messaging and social media app Telegram. Over the course of 18 months, the BBC discovered six different websites and applications promoted on the platform. Together, they were said to operate more than 180 hidden cameras in hotel rooms, which not only recorded but live-streamed guests’ activities.
Eric, from Hong Kong, began watching secretly recorded videos as a teenager, attracted by the “raw” nature of the images.
“What attracts me is the fact that people not knowing they are being filmed“, says Eric, now in his 30s. “I think traditional pornography seems very staged, very fake.”
But he experienced the other side of that chain when he found a video of him and his girlfriend, Emily, and he says I don’t like this type of content anymore.
When she told Emily that the couple’s stay at the hotel had been filmed, edited into an hour-long video and posted on Telegram, she thought it was a joke. But when she saw the images, she was devastated.
Emily feared the video had been seen by co-workers and family. The couple spent weeks without speaking.
So how does this industry that exploits intimate sexual acts by unsuspecting couples for paying customers interested in voyeurism work, and who is behind it?
One of the most active traders of hidden camera pornography is an agent known as “AKA.”
After logging in, you can choose between five different transmissionseach showing several hotel rooms, visible as soon as the guest activated the electricity by inserting the key card. It was also possible to rewind the broadcast from the beginning and transfer archived videos.
On Telegram, an application banned in China but widely used for illicit activities, AKA published these live broadcasts. One of the channels on Telegram had up to 10 thousand members.
AKA subscribers make comments via Telegram’s channels feature while watching hotel guests they don’t know being filmed, judge their appearancecomment on conversations and evaluate sexual performance.
They celebrate when a couple starts having sex and complain when the lights are turned off, plunging the scene into darkness. Women are often described as “sluts”, “sluts” and “bitches”.
The team managed to track one of the hidden cameras to a hotel room in Zhengzhouin central China, by gathering evidence provided by subscribers, social media users and the investigation itself.
Investigators at the scene were able to access the bedroom and found the camera — with the lens pointed toward the bed — hidden in the wall ventilation unit and connected to the building’s electrical network.
A hidden camera detector, widely sold on the internet as an “indispensable” item for hotel guests, did not issue any alert that they were being spied on.
The team disabled the secret camera, and the news spread quickly on Telegram.
“Zhonghua [nome da câmera] was taken down!” wrote a subscriber on the main channel managed by AKA.
“It is a shame; that room had the best sound quality!”, AKA replied in the chat.
Over the course of the 18-month investigation, the BBC identified around a dozen agents as AKA.
The exchanges these agents had with underwriters made it clear that they worked for people higher up in the supply chain, whom they referred to as “camera owners“These individuals, the agents’ comments suggested, were responsible for installing the hidden cameras and managing the live streaming platforms.
What is clear is that there are significant sums of money at stake. Based on the number of channel members and subscription fees, the BBC estimates that AKA alone has raised at least 163,200 yuan (about 20,500 euros) since last April. In comparison, the average annual income in China last year was 43,377 yuan (approximately 5450 euros), according to the country’s official statistics body.
There are strict rules in China for the sale and use of hidden cameras, but It’s relatively easy to buy one at the country’s largest electronics market, in Huaqiangbei, Guangdong province.
Accurate data on how many people have been taken to court for hidden camera pornography is harder to come by. Chinese authorities have released far fewer details of legal proceedings in recent years.
Blue Li, from a Hong Kong-based NGO called RainLily that helps victims remove explicit images recorded without consent from the internet, says demand for the group’s services is growing, but that the work has slowed down. made more difficult.
According to him, Telegram never responds to RainLily’s removal requests, which forces the organization to contact group administrators, who have little incentive to respond.
“We believe that technology companies have a huge responsibility to address these problems, because are not neutral platforms; their policies shape how content spreads,” Li said.
Eric and Emily remain traumatized by the experience. They wear hats in public for fear of being recognized and try to avoid hotels. Eric says he no longer uses these Telegram channels to watch pornography, but he still checks them occasionally, out of fear that the video will be circulated again.
