People are searching for porn while stuck at home during the coronavirus

Porn-related keyword searches surge on Baidu, China’s largest search engine

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People are searching for porn while stuck at home during the coronavirus

Karen Chiu

Published: 7:30pm, 10 Mar 2020

This article originally appeared on ABACUS

Offices and factories were shut down. Residential compounds were under partial lockdown. But life went on: As people hunkered down at home during the spread of the coronavirus epidemic in China, those looking to kill time have been turning to games, sports… and, apparently, pornography.

Searches for the word “maopian” (a Chinese nickname for porn that roughly translates as “hair movie”) surged on China’s biggest search engine over Lunar New Year, according to numbers obtained from Baidu Index. That coincides with the beginning of an extended national holiday that the Chinese government put in place to help contain the epidemic.

Meet Baidu, China’s homegrown search engine

People likely didn’t get very far just searching one word, so they tried other terms as well. Numbers from Baidu show that searches for porn-related keywords also increased, including “Europe and US all free to watch” and “A movie” -- another Chinese nickname for porn. A search by Abacus on Baidu’s search engine found that some of these keywords do lead to websites hosting adult material. And some of those sites can even be accessed in mainland China, where porn is banned.

Search for “maopian” initially plunged at the start of the Lunar New Year -- a time when families traditionally gather to feast and celebrate. The numbers picked up soon after and stayed strong. (Picture: Baidu Index)

The quest for porn didn’t seem to wane after the holiday ended in early February. The search volume for maopian remained high, in contrast with previous months when numbers would occasionally shoot up over the weekend and die down again later.

Although workers were supposed to return to work after the holiday, many businesses have adopted a flexible approach, allowing employees to work from home. Demand for office apps were so high that some servers buckled under the pressure.