Didi sues adult film creator over fake sexual assault video

Didi Chuxing, China’s largest ride-hailing company, has filed a lawsuit against a couple who filmed a staged pornographic video featuring a Didi driver drugging and raping a female passenger. The company said that the explicit video had tarnished its reputation and seriously undermined its efforts to protect passengers from sexual assault and harassment.

The scandal has been front and center all over the Chinese social media since last week. On Wednesday, a Weibo user shared an anonymous article that first appeared on GitHub, a global software development platform that’s accessible in China and free from censorship. In the post, the author raised questions about a video uploaded to an underground livestreaming website named Xīngliàn 星恋, in which a man who claimed to be a Didi driver filmed himself drugging a female passenger and raping her after she lost consciousness. The post’s creator also noted that thousands of users on the platform paid to watch the assault happening in real time.

The claims quickly drew public attention online, with a number of internet users demanding a thorough investigation into what seemed to be a sexual assault case. On June 11, Didi wrote on Weibo (in Chinese) that it was aware of the accusations and had reported the incident to the police.

A day later, in an unexpected turn of events, police in Zhengzhou, Henan Province, released (in Chinese) its investigation results, saying that the perpetrator and the victim in the video were actually a couple who staged the sexual act and tried to profit off the views it received. The police also said that the couple had been arrested for “violating social norms and disrupting public orders.”

In a statement (in Chinese) released on June 15, Didi announced that it had decided to take the couple to court for smearing Didi drivers’ reputation by creating an association of pornography. Meanwhile, Didi’s CEO Chén Xī 陈熙, who oversees the company’s ride-hailing business, said in a Weibo post that it’s unfair to stigmatize the entire group of Didi drivers based on the acts of a few mentally deranged individuals. “We need our drivers’ cooperation to ensure the effectiveness of all the safety measures we rolled out. It’s unfair to associate them with crimes,” Chen wrote.

The news occurred at a time when the public was gradually rebuilding its trust in Didi after a string of high-profile scandals involving Didi drivers who sexually harassed female passengers, and, in some extreme cases, murdered them after the assault. In May 2018, the ride-hailing giant came under intense scrutiny after a Didi driver raped and killed a female passenger. About three months later, Didi found itself in hot water again due to another rape and murder case of a female passenger who used its services. 

In the wake of the murders, Didi fired two senior executives and vowed to prioritize improving “its customer service over its revenue growth.” Since then, the company has been taking steps to improve safety within its app, such as limiting its carpooling service to same-sex rides only and implementing more stringent background checks on its drivers.