Craigslist appears to have surrendered in a legal fight over erotic ads posted on its website, shutting down its adult services section Saturday and replacing it with a black bar that simply says "censored. The move comes just over a week after a group of state attorneys general said there weren't enough protections against blocking potentially illegal ads promoting prostitution.
It's not clear if the closure is permanent, and it appears to only affect ads in the United States. The listings came under new scrutiny after the jailhouse suicide last month of a former medical student who was awaiting trial in the killing of a masseuse he met through Craigslist, a popular site that lets users post classified ads, often for free.
Craigslist's adult services section carried ads for everything from personal massages to a night's companionship, which critics say veered into prostitution. Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster said in a May blog posting that the company's ads were no worse than those published by the alternative newspaper chain Village Voice Media.
Craigslist has been caught for years in a murky legal fight that centers on how much responsibility the company bears for its ads, said Jonathan Zittrain, professor of law and computer science at Harvard University. Prosecutors can argue Craigslist is an "intermediary" to the crime of prostitution, Zittrain said, but such cases are hard to prove.
He said prosecutors must essentially prove that Craigslist knew an ad was a solicitation for prostitution; ads on Craigslist are typically worded more vaguely. Nonetheless, to avoid a legal showdown, the company has tried to keep "inappropriate activity" off its site by screening ads. It's unclear if Craigslist felt the attorneys general had a good argument, or if it simply got tired of spending time on the issue.
