A recent article from the Daily Beast talked about how facial ID is being used to detain and even ban sex workers from entering the country.

And it got me thinking: every year in January, quite a few adult performers attempt to come to the United States to attend the AVN show held each year in Las Vegas, which concludes with the infamous AVN awards, often referred to as the Oscars of Porn.

But those performers might not be so lucky this year because AI is changing the game.

It doesn’t matter what country you are from, getting into the US to take part in the AVN show is going to become more and more problematic.

I first heard about the now not so top secret facial recognition database of adult performers a few years ago, well before the explosion of news about AI advancements like ChatGTP.

I later found out that the government, specifically Homeland Security, has upped their game and added a database of all adult performers who have ever been associated with escorting, and that means any girl who has ever been on any escorting website of any kind, even if you aren’t an escort and someone just puts you on there anyway.

(You all know who I mean who does this)

From what I understand, this database was created by a Canadian tech company with the intention of sharing it with social media websites (yes, including Instagram and Facebook), who could then use that as a justification in any potential legal dealings for banning these people from their platforms. This is all to do with SESTA/FOSTA. If a company knows you are a hooker, then they can use that as their excuse. You don’t need to post anything inappropriate. Just the fact that you are in that database would be enough of a reason to ban you from their platform for life.

Well, as it turns out, that very same information can be used to ban sex workers from entering the country. Even if prostitution isn’t illegal in your home country, it is in America, and you don’t even have to be an actual hooker for this to matter. Because the federal government apparently doesn’t have a distinction between being a porn star and a prostitute.

Now, I’m not a lawyer, so I don’t understand all of the details of how that works, but in the end, I suspect this database and the use of AI facial recognition is going to start causing huge travel problems for all adult performers – those wanting to enter the US for things like AVN and those who live in the US who want to visit countries like Dubai and other very conservative countries.

The bad part is, apparently, you don’t get the denial until you enter the country. So you fly all the way here to America, land, and get nailed after you get off the plane and then have to fly back home with your 5 to 10-year travel ban to the US.

I don’t get why they aren’t stopping them prior to ever getting on the flight to the US in the first place. That’s just fucked up.