Church sues Porn Site after porn streamed during Bible study class

A San Francisco church is suing Zoom after one of its bible study classes was allegedly infiltrated by a hacker who bombarded the video call with porn.

The Saint Paulus Lutheran Church, one of the oldest churches in the city, held a bible study class on May 6, in which most of the attendees were senior citizens.

But 42 minutes into the class, their computer screens were “hijacked” and “control buttons disabled” while pornographic video was streamed, according to a federal lawsuit filed on Wednesday on behalf of the church and its church administrator.

“The footages were sick and sickening — portraying adults engaging in sexual acts with each other and performing sexual acts on infants and children, in addition to physically abusing them,” the lawsuit said, adding that Zoom admitted the hacker was a “known serial offender” who had been reported “multiple times to the authorities.”

In the suit, the plaintiffs accuse Zoom of “prioritizing profit and revenue over data protection and user security” and are seeking damages for negligence, invasion of privacy and violations of California state consumer protection and privacy statutes among other things.

“The Church filed this lawsuit only after Zoom refused to take its concerns seriously,” Mark Molumphy, one of the church’s lawyers, told CNN in an email statement.

“One would think that Zoom — having been informed of the Church’s horrific experience — would’ve done everything possible to acknowledge and fix the security vulnerabilities of its platform,” Molumphy, a partner at Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy One, said.