Beyond the Gaze:The working practices, regulation and safety of Internet-based sex work in the UK

技术，特别是数字通信，对我们如何组织生活、处理关系以及商业和零售交易产生了深远的影响。性产业也遵循了这一趋势，在线性市场不断扩大和多样化，改变了性交易的形式。然而，没有任何监管，也很少有警察关注基于互联网的性市场。我们首要的问题是：互联网如何塑造了英国21世纪世纪的成人商业性行业，监管的作用是什么？我们的研究重点是知识的差距，市场是如何结构的，它是如何运作的，以及它目前是如何监管的。我们关注的是那些在自己家中合法工作的人，或者作为护送人员去酒店和客户家中出诊的人，这些人都远离了警察的普通目光。没有注意到技术和商业性行为类型之间的相互作用，如网络摄像头性行为;表演现场性行为和聊天;性故事讲述;以及利基市场如何发展，既允许性工作者创新，又开辟了工作机会。因此，我们的整体调查旨在解释监管如何与互联网环境相互作用的脆弱性和安全性的经验。通过互联网工作对性工作者来说更安全吗？是否存在意外的安全问题？性工作者是否因互联网的孤立而变得更加脆弱，或者技术是否提供了加强安全的机制？因此，本研究的目的有三个：（a）了解新技术对改变性消费和性产业的社会实践的更广泛的理论意义。B）在联合王国性工作监管和治安的更广泛进程中，绘制基于互联网的性工作市场的趋势并了解其工作做法。（c）促进将基于互联网的性工作纳入与安全和健康有关的规定、政策和机构。我们打算使用混合方法来回答这些问题，以收集新的经验知识，并设计了一个项目，包括一个大型的全国性性工作者的在线调查，定性访谈80名性工作者和40个访谈那些参与在线性工作活动的警务和监管（如警察，内政部代表，IT专家）。同行研究人员将协助招募参与者，促进项目以及审查影响计划的进展情况。此外，通过一名研究、支助和发展网络联络干事，项目小组还发挥综合服务提供和发展作用。除学院外，该项目还有三个主要受益群体，他们是该项目的合作者：1）警察，通过警察局长协会和国家卖淫问题领导机构，以及决策者（地方和国家政府）。2)在线工作的性工作者和更广泛的性工作社区。3)性工作项目和与性工作者一起工作的从业人员-法定部门和第三部门，包括向性工作者提供具体临床服务的性健康从业人员。这些群体将通过以下方式受益：1）每周通过互联网（称为Netreach）向性工作者（所有性别）提供从业者外展服务，提供安全信息，为健康和福利指路，并提供保密的倾听服务，为期3年。2)与联合王国性工作项目网络合作，开发了一个网络推广工具包，用于网络推广的良好做法模式。3)减少针对性工作者的暴力和犯罪，扩大这一群体诉诸司法的机会。4)总体影响目标是通过参与政府进程和专家证人请求，为卖淫监管方面的立法和政策提供信息并对其产生影响。

Technology, particularly digital communication, has had a profound impact on how we organise our lives, conduct our relationships and the transactions of commerce and retail. The sex industry has followed this trend, with the online sex markets expanding and diversifying, changing the shape of how sex is bought and sold. Yet no regulation and very little policing focuses on the Internet-based sex markets. Our overarching question is: How has the Internet shaped the 21st Century adult commercial sex industry in the UK and what is the role of regulation? Our research focuses on the gaps in knowledge, in terms of how the market is structured, how it functions and how it is currently regulated. We are concerned with those individuals who work legally in their own homes, or as escorts doing outcalls to hotels and clients' homes, all away from the ordinary gaze of policing. There has been no attention to the interactions between technology and types of commercial sex such as webcam sex; performing live sex acts and chat; sexual story telling; and how niche markets have developed both allowing sex workers to innovate as well as opening up working opportunities. Therefore our overall inquiry seeks to explain how regulation interacts with the Internet setting in relation to the experience of vulnerability and safety. Is working via the Internet safer for sex workers? Are there unintended safety issues? Are sex workers made more vulnerable by the isolation of the Internet or does technology provide mechanisms to enhance safety? Therefore the aims of this research are threefold: a)to understand the wider theoretical significance of new technologies for changing the social practice of sexual consumption and the sex industry. b) to map the trends and understand the working practices in Internet-based sex work markets within the broader processes of the regulation and policing of sex work in the UK. c) to facilitate the integration of Internet-based sex work into safety and health-related provision, policies and agencies. We intend to answer these questions using a mixed methodology to gather new empirical knowledge, and have designed a project consisting of a large national online survey of sex workers; qualitative interviews with 80 sex workers and 40 interviews those involved in the policing and regulation of online sex work activities (such as the police, Home Office representative, IT specialists). Peer researchers will assist in the recruitment of participants, promoting the project as well as reviewing the progress of the Impact Plan. In addition, there is an integrated service provision and developmental role built into the project team through a Research, Support and Development Netreach Officer. Beyond the academy, the project has three key beneficiary groups who are collaborators on the project: 1) Police through the Association of Chief Police Officers and the National Lead for Prostitution, policy makers (local and national government. 2) Sex workers who work online and the broader sex work community. 3) sex work projects and practitioners who work with sex workers - both statutory and third sector, including sexual health practitioners who deliver specific clinical services to sex workers. These groups will benefit in the following ways: 1) a practitioner outreach service with sex workers (all genders) via the Internet (known as Netreach) will be delivered on a weekly basis providing information on safety, signposting to health, welfare and offering a confidential listening service for 3 years. 2) In collaboration with partners the UK Network of Sex Work Projects, the development of a Netreach toolkit for good practice models of Internet outreach. 3) Reduction in violence and crimes against sex workers and broader access to justice for this group. 4) Overall impact aims are to inform and influence legislation and policy in the regulation of prostitution through engaging in government processes and expert witness requests.