Darina Lebedeva lost her job the day before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. She was only 18 and felt hopeless about securing a new job with a decent salary while her country was under attack by Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Until Feb. 24, 2022, she had worked remotely for a retail website. Like countless other jobs in Ukraine, the work vanished as soon as the first shots of the war were fired. She had roughly $3,000 in her bank account, which would last her only five months.
“The war took everyone by surprise. People did not know what to do. Since the beginning of the invasion, many have left their jobs, but there were practically no jobs at all after a while,” Lebedeva told The Daily Beast.
ADVERTISEMENT
Now 19, Lebedeva said this lack of income is prompting her and other women to make a decision: “Either webcam [sex worker] or OnlyFans. I chose the second because there you can regulate the content,” she said, explaining that webcam work is more graphic than OnlyFans.
The economic turmoil brought on by the war has left some citizens with few options to get by. As a result, some are turning to OnlyFans, the online platform for sex workers worldwide, as a way to make an income quickly. Despite the risks, OnlyFan models in the country are ignoring federal laws and making thousands of dollars per month in a new wartime job they had never considered before the invasion.
Lebedeva knew nothing about sex work and struggled to get advice because, in Ukraine, “People do not understand such platforms. They disrespect the girls of this profession. I was skeptical about OnlyFans. It seemed to me that it was terrible as if you were selling yourself like a girl in a brothel.”
“It was really difficult. I had to constantly look for customers. I had no one to ask. And the customers were different, and their orders were sometimes such that I would have not done for any money. It was emotionally exhausting,” she added.
In 2021, unemployment in Ukraine was at 9.8 percent, and the inflation rate was 9.63 percent. By December 2022, the unemployment rate had jumped to 26 percent, and consumer prices were rising at nearly 30 percent, according to the National Bank of Ukraine’s January 2023 Inflation Report.
Adding to Lebedeva’s stress, OnlyFans falls under Ukraine’s prostitution laws, making it illegal in the country, according to Article 301 of the country’s Criminal Code .
The law states that, “Actions committed in regard to pornographic motion pictures and video films, or computer programs, also selling pornographic images” are punished by fines or jail time for up to five years.
But despite the law, OnlyFans generated $620,000 in taxes for Ukraine, suggesting that business is booming, according to a Telegram post by Danylo Hetmantsev, chairman of the Committee on Finance, Tax and Customs Policy.
“It is illegal, but in practice I have never seen cases where girls were sent to prison for working at this job. When I first started, there were fears about this,” said Lebedeva.
Ukraine’s sex industry has gained international recognition in recent years. In 2016, there were believed to be over 80,000 sex workers in the county.
Russia’s war only amplified the search for Ukrainian sex workers. According to a report by Thomson Reuters, in the first three months of the war there was a spike in demand for pornography related to Ukrainian women throughout Europe. According to the report, there was a 200 percent increase in searches for “Ukrainian escorts” in the U.K. compared to six months before the start of the war. In Spain, there was a 600 percent increase in searches for “Ukrainian porn” and in Poland, there was a 130 percent rise.
Leonardo Meyher, a 25-year-old IT worker and drag queen in Kyiv, says OnlyFans has been a great way to bolster the income from his regular job. Before the war, Meyher had a Telegram channel with 34 subscribers, where he would be paid to post sexual content, but at most he would make around $100 per set of pictures. Despite having a full-time job, Meyher said he needed more money as the war raged on and inflation spiked in Ukraine. In April 2023, he began his OnlyFans account, which he said gave him an outlet for creative expression alongside a thriving community of other queer users.
“If I have it and other people love it, why not I can sell photos and videos of myself?” he said. “I have normal work, and I do the drag queen shows.”
Meyher has no concerns about breaking the law by using OnlyFans. “I don’t care because life in Ukraine is like: You live today, and nobody knows what is happening tomorrow,” he said.
A man named Stas told The Daily Beast that he started using OnlyFans after losing his job as a restaurant server in Dnipro. “During the war, it’s hard to find a job where you can earn that kind of money. I had good looks, so I thought ‘Why not?’” Another model who spoke with The Daily Beast said she also began using OnlyFans during the war to supplement her income.
In November 2022, Lebedeva began to work with a management company that has since helped grow her number of subscribers to 157, which helped her accumulate up to $4,500 in monthly payments, a staggering amount in Ukraine where, even in 2021, the median income was around $390 per month.
“I started working alone. It was really difficult. I had to constantly look for customers and traffic. I had no one to ask. I could just [wait] all day. But when I started working with an agency, it became much easier. I began to feel less stressed,” she added.
According to Lebedeva, she takes up to 50 pictures daily and makes seven videos per week to upload to her OnlyFans platform. Her content varies from pornographic to teaming up with other OnlyFans models and photographers to create more artistic content for her subscribers.
“For the most part, these people are from Europe, U.S. Often these are lonely people who want not only to look at beautiful girls who are ready to fulfill their wishes but to chat about something. They are also very worried about the situation in my country. They express words of support, wish us a speedy victory.”
Lebedeva receives less than half of the money she makes because her management company gets 30 percent of her OnlyFans income, and the app itself charges a 20 percent fee on all subscriptions, which Lebedeva said she is fine with.
“There are more benefits to this job than most people think. Some girls, when they find out who I work for, ask questions about my profession. First of all, I try to convey to them that they must understand whether they are selling the body and getting money or they are creating something more,” Lebedeva said.
One benefit, Lebedeva explained, is that she can pose for a couple of pictures and take multiple videos and that is all the work she needs to do. Alternatively, she said, “You can spend more time, but do it better and enjoy the process yourself. At the same time, to see in yourself the beauty that others will see… it raises self-esteem and relieves complexes.”
