We don't need a formal study to tell us that taking away sex workers' ability to communicate online makes their lives worse—sex workers have been saying that for a decade now, since the federal government started taking down websites where they advertised (RIP MyRedBook, Rentboy, The Review Board, Backpage, and so on). But here's a(nother) study saying exactly this.
For the study, published in the journal Social Sciences, researcher Melissa Ditmore and her team conducted a national survey of 440 sex workers, asking about how they used online platforms, how the use of these platforms affected their working conditions, and how laws like the Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act (FOSTA)—which led to platforms removing and restricting sex worker accounts—affected their work lives. Survey respondents included folks who had engaged in webcam work, phone sex work, strip club work, pornography, independent escorting, street-based sex work, working at a brothel, working at a massage parlor, BDSM/fetish work, working for an escort agency, and other types of sex work.
