Free web ad upsets sex worker

A Palmerston North prostitute has threatened legal action against a website operator after finding her adult advertisement posted on his sex site.

The 37-year-old, who uses the working name Kera, first noticed her advertisement on the Sex In New Zealand website two years ago.

She contacted the website's creator, an Auckland man known as "Bob", and asked to have the advertisement erased from the site.

Kera checked the site again last week when she saw an article in the Manawatu Standard about another 37-year-old "fuller-figured" prostitute, who had unknowingly been posted on the site.

The "fuller-figured" prostitute's advertisement has since been deleted but Kera was shocked to find her cellphone number and description on the site, despite sending two emails to Bob last week asking for it to be deleted.

"I basically said to him that I want my ad taken down, he's stealing my ad that I've paid for," she said. "I said if it wasn't removed, I'd be taking legal action.

"My partner is well into computers and he knows how to get websites removed, so if this Bob guy thinks I'm joking, I'm not."

Kera said she had received "strange" phone calls from Auckland-based men, who had viewed her online advertisement.

"It's attracting idiots, bloody psychos. They say they are just making inquiries but they just sound weird. I had one who asked me if I would come up to Auckland."

The website's creator, Bob, was unfazed by Kera's legal threats, but said he was happy to take her advertisement off the site. "They can't say I'm defaming them because they are doing the work and you can't be defamed when you're using a false name.

"Most of them have false names, they usually have false ages and usually false weights."

Most of the girls on the site, which he started as a hobby in 1999, were more than happy with the free advertising.

"It's a free site, I'm not making anything from it.

"If she wants it off there, no problem."

He preferred to delete numbers if the girls contacted him on the phone, as he was not always sure if emails were genuine.

"It could be a girl who was being bitchy and trying to get another girl off there."

The advertisement had been deleted, he said today.

- © Fairfax NZ News