Pornhub’s shadowy parent company MindGeek said it is changing its name as its new owners seek a “fresh start” for the scandal-ridden smut empire.
MindGeek — which has faced scrutiny in recent years for allegedly hosting content involving revenge porn, child sex abuse, and victims of sex-trafficking — is rebranding to the name “Aylo” effectively immediately, the company said.
The “Aylo” name is likely to lead to some head-scratching — but a company spokesperson said the word was chosen specifically because it doesn’t have a meaning and can’t be found in the dictionary.
“We wanted a fresh start, so we opted for a name that gave us that freedom, so that our team and our new owners could define it how we want,” the company said.
The new branding and logo is set to roll out across all company communications and digital platforms.
Ethical Capital Partners, the Canadian buyout firm that purchased MindGeek last March, said it opted to change the company’s name after meeting with employees and other “external stakeholders” who spoke out in favor of a rebrand.
“We heard from the team that they needed a fresh start,” Ethical Capital’s vice president of public engagement Sarah Bain said in a statement.
“At the same time, ECP also committed to be more present in conversations that impact Aylo’s business, along with plans to correct information and public perception about the company, who they are, and how they present themselves to the world,” Bain added.
Ethical Capital Partners is in the midst of a sweeping campaign to make Pornhub and its affiliates more palatable to the mainstream public. The effort has included repeated public assurances by Ethical Capital representatives regarding the firm’s commitment to a “zero tolerance” policy on illegal videos.
As The Post reported earlier this week, Ethical Capital recently promoted Alexzandra Kekesi, Pornhub’s former marketing director, to a new role as head of community and brand.
Kekesi will spearhead the site’s creative direction and outreach to its network of porn stars, as well as Pornhub’s handling of key public matters, such as Instagram’s decision to permanently ban its account last fall.
Kekesi welcomed the rebrand in a statement obtained by The Post.
“My colleagues and I are proud to work at Aylo and we are eager to build this brand as a tech leader,” Kekesi said. “Under this new banner, we will continue to commit to our core values of consent, freedom of sexual expression, authenticity, originality and diversity.”
Aside from Pornhub, the company’s portfolio includes several porn brands, including YouPorn, Brazzers and Men.com. The company purports to have a daily audience of 130 milion users across its network of sites.
Prior to the rebrand, MindGeek had suffered a series of setbacks, including losing access to some Visa and Mastercard payments systems after a damning New York Times report in 2020 on the spread of illegal video content that spread via Pornhub and the crisis’ effect on impacted victims.
When that report surfaced, Pornhub responded by purging millions of videos from the site.
Pornhub and its parent company have repeatedly denied wrongdoing when hit with allegations of hosting illegal content, even as they bolstered content moderation tools on the site.
Aylo highlighted the various steps it takes to protect users, including a requirement that all uploaded content comes from verified users and partnerships with “more than 50 nonprofit organizations globally to combat child sex abuse material.
Last June, MindGeek CEO Feras Antoon and COO David Tassillo resigned from their leadership roles at the company roughly one week after the New Yorker published a sweeping takedown of the company and the spread of nonconsensual sex videos.
Bain told The Post that those roles have yet to be filled, though the search is actively underway. The entire previous MindGeek ownership group exited the company as part of Ethical Capital’s acquisition earlier this year, she added.
So far, Ethical Capital has declined to reveal who is currently in charge at Aylo. Bain said there are multiple C-suite executives in place, including a chief financial officer and “one individual that is the leader of the company,” but would not elaborate.
Other major question, such as where Ethical Capital got the money to buy Pornhub and how much it paid, also remain unanswered.
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