One sex worker says changes to the on-demand website OnlyFans could see people in the industry forced into exploitative situations.
The site, which allows creators to post content and charge subscribers for access to it, is to ban sexually explicit photos and videos from October 1st.
Users can still post nudity, as long as it is in line with the platform's Acceptable Use Policy.
The company says the changes are to comply with the requests of its banking partners and payout providers.
In a statement, it says: "In order to ensure the long-term sustainability of the platform, and to continue to host an inclusive community of creators and fans, we must evolve our content guidelines.
"Creators will continue to be allowed to post content containing nudity as long as it is consistent with our Acceptable Use Policy.
"OnlyFans remains committed to the highest levels of safety and content moderation of any social platform.
"All creators are verified prior to being able to upload any content to OnlyFans, and all uploaded content is checked by automated systems and human moderators."
OnlyFans says it has 130 million users and over two million content creators.
Sex worker Kate McGrew told Moncrieff the changes could move some people into dangerous situations.
"There was an article that came out in The New York Times in December that was putting pressure on financial platforms to stop taking payment from sex workers.
"They put pressure to shut down Craigslist, they put pressure to shut down backpage.com... and it resulted in so many sex workers being unable to do the work that they were previously, and being forced back to doing in-person work, to working with bosses or exploitative bosses or working in the street."
'Lifeline' during the pandemic
Kate says sites like OnlyFans can offer sex workers a protection.
"When you're looking at an industry that's criminalised, that's stigmatised and is therefore mostly existing on a black market, it's hard for these kinds of workers to have protections.
"We don't have the ability, unfortunately, to unionise".
She says she understands that content should be reviewed for safety reasons, but this is not what is happening.
"It's one thing to review content and make sure that nobody is being abused or exploited, but it's a slippery slope - and what ends up happening is that people get constrained in ways that they're not able to post at all, and they have to look for other ways of making money.
"If we really want to protect people, and make sure that people are only doing work that they want to, we need to be going directly to the State and asking for more supports to cover our basic needs".
And she says while some OnlyFans users can migrate to other platforms, it has been a 'lifeline' during the pandemic.
"It needs to be said that this has been a lifeline for people during the pandemic.
"It needs to be said that because there was a proliferation - a real boom - in people starting to do online work and sell content during the pandemic, part of the concern is that people are now going to move who didn't want to into in-person work.
"But there are sites - there's Escort Fans in Ireland, there's JustForFans as well.
"And they've been reaching out to people, EscortFans specifically, reaching out to people who advertise there today to let us know that we are safe to continue our work there".
