In a new investigation for BBC Three and BBC One, Amber Haque uncovers allegations of exploitation, coercion, violence, and the potential for modern slavery committed by OnlyFans managers.
OnlyFans: Inside the Machine exposes an industry where young women feel trapped, threatened, and profited from – raising urgent questions about accountability at the heart of one of Britain’s most lucrative tech companies.
Amber explores how Manchester has become a ‘UK epicentre’ for the OnlyFans community, where entire floors of some high-rise buildings have been converted into dedicated content studios.
What is OnlyFans?
OnlyFans is the English company that has transformed how explicit content is made and sold.
The platform has made millions from its creators selling photos and videos. However, beneath the surface, the website’s rapid growth has attracted a new entrepreneur: self-styled OnlyFans managers.
OnlyFans managers, known across social media as OFMs, promise rapid growth to earnings, however lack of regulation has created risks for creators, including unfair revenue splits, disadvantageous contracts, coercion, and sometimes violence.
The dark side of OnlyFans: Rebecca’s story
Amber speaks to Rebecca, a creator from South Wales, who is telling her story for the first time.
Rebecca started working on OnlyFans last year.
“I was introduced to one agency who another friend of mine was with”, Rebecca says.
The agency asked Rebecca to fill out a form with her OnlyFans login details and passwords, obtaining full access to her account.
“They’d first offered me 70% of the cut, so they were getting 30% and I’d get 70%. Then they changed their mind and it was 50-50%.”
“And then within a few weeks, whatever I was sending in, they would start saying that I looked like shit…and then it just started being quite abusive, quite controlling.”
The agency also tried to convince Rebecca to engage in sex work.
“When I said no, they tried telling me how much good money I would make from it”, Rebecca says.
The intimidation and violence began when another creator signed to the same agency as Rebecca was locked out of her account.
“She’d phone me up crying, she was in hysterics, she was like, I don’t know what to do, I’ve got so much money in there, and they blocked me out”, Rebecca says.
After hearing this, Rebecca immediately changed her passwords on the platform, barring her agency from entering her account.
“From me doing that, it just escalated, massively”, Rebecca says.
“There was a lot of verbal abuse, phone calls.”
Rebecca shows the BBC some of the messages she received from her agency which include threats to her daughter’s safety.
“I will have you and your daughter wrote off”, one message reads.
A few weeks later Rebecca was attacked at home.
“I’d come through the front door, still had my house key in my hand, and before I’d taken my shoes off, I heard somebody come through the door and they just strangled me. I didn’t know what was happening.”
“They were on top of me strangling me and I just tried getting my phone to ring somebody because I thought, this is it.”
“And then they just stopped. After they proved their point, they just stopped and left.”
“There were bruises all over me.”
To many observers, OnlyFans is a tech success story.
Estimates suggest the top 1% of OnlyFans creators are pulling in somewhere between £7,000 and £25,000 a month.
What women face on OnlyFans
Amber speaks to Lily Phillips, one of the most successful OnlyFans creators, to find out more about what it’s like for the women selling content through the platform.
Lily says, “People realise how much money you can make from OnlyFans. Everyone wants a piece of the pie, especially men…I do believe that they can be a little bit jealous of how we have gained independence and can earn so much money on sex work and they want their little piece”, she says.
“I’ve always said there’s no handbook, like when I first joined, I was newly 19 and I had no clue how to run it or any of the warnings of what comes with the job. I would have loved that personally, but there are no regulations to it, and I think that is the dangerous space where vulnerable people can be taken advantage of.”
“We need help and we need regulations in our industry, but people don’t really care because they don’t see us as human.”
As a platform built on explicit content, OnlyFans have always said safety is at the heart of its mission.
Its policy states: “We’re dedicated to delivering robust safeguards that prioritise the safety, privacy and wellbeing of the whole OnlyFan’s community.”
“Our subscription model makes it difficult for people to engage in modern slavery and human trafficking.”
However, management practices appear to have reshaped how the system operates in practice.
What the data shows about OnlyFans
Amber speaks to two data researchers from cybersecurity and data investigations company, DataExpert.
They have been following the OFM space since it emerged, monitoring OFM groups online and tracking the evolution of this private digital ecosystem.
Their research has found evidence of threats, hacking, and trafficking. Creators’ profiles are being sold online between OnlyFans managers without their knowledge.
A creator’s content might now be in the hands of a stranger who she does not have an agreement with and did not sign a contract with.
OFMs encourage each other not to tell the creator that her profile has been sold or that her contract has been purchased by another manager.
The recruitment and transfer of people for exploitation could amount to a breach of Modern Slavery laws in England.
However, there have been no attempts so far to ban management contracts or to regulate the ecosystem.
An MP speaks up
The BBC presented its findings to Tonia Antoniazzi MP, Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Commercial Sexual Exploitation.
When asked if she thinks OnlyFans is breaking any laws, Tonia Antoniazzi MP says, “I think those laws that are being broken are hiding behind a paywall and they [OnlyFans] choose not to see it.”
“This is like the biggest pimping website that exists. We’ve seen online platforms just move at great speed. They are exploiting that. They need to be held to account.”
“We need to be looking at this in government. I would like to see a Select Committee look at OnlyFans as it is, as it stands now, and create legislation around this area because it’s a whole new world.”
OnlyFans responds
In response to the BBC’s findings, an OnlyFans spokesperson said: “OnlyFans was designed to empower creators to control and monetise their content. We take the safety of our users incredibly seriously and invest heavily in measures to protect our community, including strict onboarding processes, payment controls and ongoing account moderation.”
“The allegation we ‘turn a blind eye’ to these issues is unfounded…many creators choose to work with reputable third parties who assist them with the promotion and operation of their online presence and social media accounts. OnlyFans’ relationship is with our Creators and Fans and we are not connected with, and do not endorse any third parties including management agencies.”
“OnlyFans meets all of its duties under the Online Safety Act.”
“OnlyFans’ safety by design approach helps catch bad actors trying to abuse our platform. Anyone exploiting our community should be reported to us and to the police.”
“In the UK, where a creator requests a payout from their OnlyFans account, our third-party payment providers undertake Confirmation of Payee checks when processing that payment. Where this check is not successful the payment will be rejected.”
“In addition to our own proactive safety controls, if anyone raises a concern about a Creator’s account, we will immediately restrict the account, conduct an investigation and take action to ensure the Creator is in control of their OnlyFans account.”
“We work closely with law enforcement to support investigations and with charities and expert groups to continuously evolve our safety features.”
OnlyFans: Inside the Machine is on BBC Three at 9pm and BBC One at 10:55pm. It is available to stream on BBC iPlayer now.
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