Mother's Shock at Explicit Vinted Advertisement
A mother from Carlisle has demanded immediate action from online marketplace Vinted after she was confronted with a disturbing video advertisement depicting a rape scene while browsing for clothing. Kirsty Hopley, a 44-year-old law and criminology teacher, was searching for an old-fashioned fluffy dressing gown on the popular second-hand app when the explicit advert appeared unexpectedly between product listings.
The video was titled 'My girlfriend is having an affair with my father' and showed what Kirsty described to Metro as an 'awful' scene of sexual violence. She provided a detailed account of the disturbing content: 'The man touches the woman and she resists. He then touches her breasts then up her skirt then his head goes up the skirt, he then has her thong in his hand.'
Kirsty continued: 'He is then behind her and thrusting whilst she has blood on her face. Afterwards she's crying. Then it starts again.' This incident occurred on November 20, 2025, highlighting significant concerns about content moderation on platforms frequently used by families.
Platform Safety and Reporting Failures
The mother-of-four, who has two teenage daughters aged 13 and 15, stated she will no longer allow her children to use Vinted because she cannot trust they will be safe from adult content. 'I'm really disappointed, because it's such a good business, and then all of sudden I feel like they've just got greedy and they're just putting whatever ads they want on there and it's just not on,' she expressed.
Kirsty emphasized the particular risk to children, noting: 'Responsible people can seek that sort of stuff out; they don't want it pumped in their face when there's children's stuff on there – I could just as easily have been looking at clothes for my grandson.' This was not the first time she had encountered the problematic advertisement, having seen it days earlier but scrolling past it despite finding it 'unusual', especially given that her internet has content filters in place.
When the ad appeared again while she was sitting next to one of her daughters, Kirsty took screenshots to report it while hiding her screen from view. Her experience with Vinted's reporting system proved equally frustrating. After receiving an initial automated response, she was asked days later to find the advert again and click on the link to identify the destination URL.
Broader Concerns and Official Response
Kirsty's shocking experience comes amid wider investigations into Vinted's content safety. Earlier the same week, France launched an official investigation into claims that some sellers were using their Vinted profiles to direct users to adult content on platforms like OnlyFans. With Vinted having no age restrictions, authorities are particularly concerned that children could be exposed to inappropriate material.
Kirsty confirmed that the problem extends beyond individual sellers, as she encountered the explicit content through Vinted's own advertising system. When customer service asked her to click the pornographic link to aid their investigation, she responded with outrage: 'Are you completely and utterly mad. You want me to click on the porn link and see where it takes me? You want me to do that for you. So you're telling me to watch more porn in order to report the porn you showed me that I didn't want to see. Absolutely sickening.'
She added that she had provided sufficient evidence through screenshots and questioned why she should be expected to repeatedly view the same section of her feed to locate the offensive material again. Although the advertisement didn't show graphic body parts, Kirsty maintained it was clearly pornographic and entirely inappropriate for children.
The advert promoted an app called DramaWave available on the Google Play Store, which describes itself as 'the ultimate streaming platform for drama series'. Dissatisfied with Vinted's response, Kirsty also reported the incident to Ofcom. It's understood that the specific advert she saw has since been removed from the platform.
A Vinted spokesperson stated: 'At Vinted, we have a zero-tolerance policy regarding unsolicited sexual communications and the promotion of sexual content. This includes prohibiting sexually explicit advertisements on our platform. Where listings or ads are found to violate these rules, we will take action including blocking or removing them.'
Despite this assurance, Kirsty insists that better procedures are needed to prevent such content from appearing in the first place, along with improved reporting mechanisms for users who encounter explicit advertisements.
