Brothel
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Amazon and Microsoft employees caught up in sex trafficking sting
The tech industry has a clear history of sexism and misogyny, but a recent Newsweek report highlights another problem. The publication got its hands on a slew of emails sent to brothels and pimps between 2014 and 2016 that document the industry's patronage of brothels and purchasing of services from trafficked sex workers. Among the emails, which were obtained through a public records request to the King County Prosecutor's Office, were 67 sent from Microsoft employee email accounts, 63 from Amazon accounts and dozens more from companies like Boeing, T-Mobile, Oracle and local Seattle tech firms.
Adult Themes: The rise and fall of America's first digital brothel
If someone forced you to describe RealTouch Interactive in just two words, you'd probably call it a "digital brothel." And rightly so, as the North Carolina-based business specializes in teledildonics, wearable gadgets that let people "have sex" through the internet; a technology that lets paying customers connect with consenting partners online. In 2012, RealTouch was on the rise, getting featured in HBO's Sex/Now documentary series and Amazon's original comedy series Betas. But despite the positive press, the company's fortunes took a nosedive. RealTouch found itself unable to sell its hardware and, what's more, it is now catering to a dwindling group of existing customers. It wasn't the moral majority, however, that pushed the sex-tech outfit to the brink of collapse. It was patent licensing.
