BUCHAREST – The arrest of controversial online influencer Andrew Tate on suspicion of rape and human trafficking in Romania has shone a spotlight on the country’s burgeoning “sexcam” industry.
Within a decade, it has ballooned from a niche activity to one of the world’s biggest purveyors of virtual sex, with an estimated 500 studios popping up across the poor Eastern European country.
But the industry fears the investigation into claims that Tate – a notorious misogynist – and his brother Tristan forced women into prostitution and sexcamming will tarnish their reputation.
Romanian sexcam operators said they had no idea that the British-American kick-boxer – who claims to have made millions from sexcamming – had a studio until the “scandal” broke.
“The Tate brothers are not known in the industry and have never participated in industry events,” said Ms Maria Boroghina, a manager at Best Studios, one of Romania’s biggest sexcam operators.
A former camgirl herself, Ms Boroghina is proud of her slick operation, which takes up a whole floor of a glitzy glass building in central Bucharest.
“This job offers you the opportunity to earn big” from your early twenties, she told Agence France-Presse from her studio as young women in bathrobes stopped for coffee after several hours in front of the camera.
US$8,000 a month
Ms Boroghina said they have 160 women on their books.
She added that the average monthly after-tax salary of her camgirls is US$8,000 (S$10,619), which is about 10 times the average Romanian salary.
“Everything is transparent and legal,” Ms Boroghina said.
The girls work under contract and receive between 50 per cent and 90 per cent of the money they make for the studio, she said.
Clients pay between US$2 and US$10 per minute “for a private conversation with the girls”, who broadcast up to eight hours or more a day.
Romania’s startling success in the sexcam business has been driven by several factors, Ms Boroghina said.
“Romanian women are beautiful and smart. They speak very good English, and we have good Internet speed.”
Even though the industry is legal, it is neither regulated under Romanian law nor recognised in terms of taxation, forcing the women to work as “online service providers” based on a copyright contract.
While the Romanian industry insists that all is above board, Mr Fabrizio Sarrica of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime said: “Worldwide we have seen an increasing number of (trafficked) victims that have been recruited to work behind the camera.”
It is highly profitable for criminals because large numbers of clients from all over the world have access and the images can be used multiple times and sold on the Darknet, he added.
‘This is not fair’
But defenders of the industry like Ms Boroghina and Ms Ruxandra Tataru, an organiser of a sexcam industry event called the Bucharest Summit, said they would welcome regulation.
Sexually explicit content “only represents 5 per cent of the work”, Ms Boroghina insisted, saying Romanians cannot access Best Studios sexcams to protect the women’s privacy.
“Training is what allows a girl to earn money by keeping her clothes on for as long as possible,” she said.
Ms Tataru argued that platforms like TikTok and OnlyFans have helped to remove “the stigma around this activity”.
Anastasia, a 33-year-old former camgirl and the “models’ representative” at another Bucharest studio, Models4Models, said: “Romanian women represent 40 per cent of the video chat industry worldwide.”
The studio’s head of marketing, Alexandra, who declined to give her full name, said it was “unjust that from a scandal like this people think that Andrew Tate represents the video chat industry. This is not fair”.
Tate, 36, denies all wrongdoing and claims there is no evidence against him.
However, Ms Boroghina said the scandal could end up being positive if it pushes politicians to better regulate the expanding business.
“There is no bad publicity and I believe this case helps to put the industry back into the spotlight, as an opportunity to educate people,” she said. AFP
