We take on businesses that profit from exploitation.
The website that ran the ad, the hotel that rented the room, and the employer who held your papers can all be held accountable, alongside the person who exploited you. You do not need a police report, a conviction, or even the word trafficking to find out whether the law applies to you.
Does the law cover what happened to you?
Under federal law, sex trafficking means causing someone to engage in a commercial sex act through force, fraud, or coercion, and if you were under 18, none of that has to be proven at all. Coercion rarely looks like a locked door. It usually looks like one of the situations below. If you never thought of what happened to you as trafficking, you are not alone.
A debt
A sum you were told you owed that never got smaller and grew every time you tried to leave.
A job
Work that turned into something else, or wages that depended on doing what you were told.
Housing
A place to stay that came with conditions and could be taken away at any moment.
Papers
A visa, a passport, or a status that someone else held and controlled.
A relationship
Someone who said they loved you, and then said you owed them.
Your age
If you were under 18 at the time, the law does not require force, fraud, or coercion. That is sex trafficking.
A federal law reaches everyone who profited.
The federal Trafficking Victims Protection Act lets a survivor sue the trafficker and anyone who knowingly benefited from a venture they knew or should have known involved trafficking. New York’s own civil remedy reaches the same people. That matters because others usually profited too, and the person who exploited you is rarely the one who can pay. The website, the hotel, and the employer have assets and insurance, and each of them keeps the records a case is built from.
In New York City, the amended Gender-Motivated Violence Act also reaches institutions that enabled gender-motivated violence, which includes trafficking, and its lookback window closes July 29, 2027. How the GMVA window works · Check your New York filing deadlines
Trafficking is a business. We treat it like one.
Iliana was on the litigation team that sued Backpage.com on behalf of survivors of child sex trafficking in Florida. The company behind Backpage.com earned a fee for every ad, edited those ads to evade detection, and hid behind a federal immunity written for phone companies. Years of litigation across the country exposed all of it, Congress closed the loophole in 2018, and the Justice Department shut the site down the same year.
The federal prosecution produced a survivor-restitution fund exceeding $200 million, and our attorneys represented survivors who petitioned it before its March 31, 2026 deadline. That litigation is the model for every trafficking case we bring in New York: identify every business that took a cut, and bring the case against all of them together.
The trauma they have faced does not define them.Iliana Konidaris · On the survivors she represents, including the trafficking survivors she worked with in the Backpage litigation
Your safety comes before the case.
This case belongs to you. You decide whether to file, and when. You decide whether it settles. Your lawyer works for you, and nothing in a civil case requires you to face the people who exploited you before you are ready.
Trafficking survivors often have real reasons to worry about exposure: retaliation from the people who exploited them, a record from what they were forced to do, or their immigration status. New York courts routinely let survivors in these cases proceed as Jane Doe or John Doe, and protective orders limit who learns your identity. Learn more about how to file without your name.
Olympias Iliana Konidaris
Iliana has more than a decade of experience representing survivors of gender-based violence in New York City, including survivors of child sex trafficking in the litigation against Backpage.com. She is Co-Chair of the New York City Bar Association’s Sex and Law Committee.
More for New York survivors.
Frequently asked questions
Can I sue a website or an app that was used to exploit me?
Since 2018, often yes, because federal law no longer shields websites from sex trafficking claims. Courts are still defining how much a platform must have known or done, so we build these cases from the platform's own records, usually alongside claims against the people and businesses involved.
Can I sue a hotel where I was trafficked?
Often, yes. A hotel that kept renting rooms despite obvious warning signs is the most common example, and the case is built from the hotel's own records, staff, and policies. In March 2026 the federal appeals court for Georgia, Florida, and Alabama held that a hotel does not need to have known about a specific victim, only that trafficking was happening on its property. That ruling does not bind New York courts, but it shows where the law is moving.
I was never forced. I was told I owed money, or it started as a relationship. Does that count?
It may. Coercion under federal law is broad. It includes debt, threats, control over housing or papers, and psychological pressure, and it does not require physical force. Many survivors who never called it trafficking were describing trafficking under the law.
How long do I have to bring a trafficking claim?
The federal civil claim generally must be filed within ten years. If you were a minor, those ten years start on your 18th birthday, so many people trafficked as teenagers can file well into adulthood. New York’s state remedy and the city’s GMVA have their own deadlines, and the GMVA lookback window closes July 29, 2027. Tell us roughly when and where it happened, and we will tell you what to do next.
Do I need a police report or a criminal case?
No. A civil trafficking claim is separate from any criminal case, and you do not need to have reported, cooperated with an investigation, or seen anyone charged or convicted. A criminal case belongs to the state. A civil case belongs to you.
I was advertised on Backpage.com. Is there anything I can still do?
Yes. The deadline to petition the Backpage survivor fund was March 31, 2026, but a civil claim under federal trafficking law stands on its own, with its own deadline. It can reach the people who exploited you and the businesses that profited, and there is no cost to find out whether you have one.
Tell us where it happened. We’ll tell you who’s accountable.
You can do that in one free, confidential conversation, without giving your name or the details, and nothing happens unless you decide it should.
Free and confidential. Contacting us does not create an attorney-client relationship.
- New York State Domestic and Sexual Violence Hotline, confidential, 24/71-800-942-6906
- RAINN National Sexual Assault Hotline, 24/7800-656-HOPE
- Safe Horizon, New York City, 24 hours800-621-HOPE
- National Human Trafficking Hotline1-888-373-7888
If you are in danger right now, call 911. The New York State Office of Victim Services may help cover counseling and medical costs.
The scope of civil liability for online platforms and hospitality businesses under federal trafficking law is actively being litigated in the federal courts, and statements here reflect the law as verified for this page.
This page is attorney advertising. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome. It is general information about New York and federal law as of October 19, 2026, rather than legal advice about your situation, and the law changes. Please do not send confidential information until an attorney-client relationship is established in writing.