There is no evidence that Wayfair was ever involved in child trafficking

In 2020, a conspiracy theory spread across social media claiming that online home goods retailer Wayfair was involved in child trafficking. People claimed that odd pricing and certain product names were evidence of the theory.

VERIFY reader Leslie emailed us to ask if Wayfair was ever involved in the sex trafficking of children.

THE QUESTION

Is Wayfair involved in the sex trafficking of children?

THE SOURCES

• National Center on Sexual Exploitation

• DeliverFund, a nonprofit intelligence agency that uses technology to help law enforcement fight human trafficking

• Polaris, organization that operates the U.S. National Human Trafficking hotline

• Original VERIFY reporting in 2020

• Statement from Wayfair

• Statement from Wayfair to the BBC in 2020 

THE ANSWER

No, there is no evidence to support the claims that Wayfair was involved in the sex trafficking of children.

WHAT WE FOUND

When the conspiracy theory first spread in 2020, people on social media pointed to Wayfair products with strange names and disproportionately high prices as proof that the online furniture store was involved in child trafficking. 

These products included a “Samiyah Storage Cabinet” priced at over $14,000 and a “Duplessis Zodiac Sign Astrological Constellation Personalized Throw Pillow” at $9,999.

At the time, people claimed that these products shared the names of girls that were reported missing. The theory followed that the products had high prices because they were fronts for selling the missing girls.

Wayfair told the BBC in 2020 that the prices were accurate for the industrial grade cabinets and were the result of a glitch in the case of the pillows.

Wayfair gave VERIFY a similar statement when asked to comment in 2024.

"There is, of course, no truth to these claims," Wayfair told VERIFY. "The products in question are industrial grade cabinets that are accurately priced. Recognizing that the photos and descriptions provided by the supplier did not adequately explain the high price point, we temporarily removed the products from the site to rename them and provide a more in-depth description and photos that accurately depict the product to clarify the price point. We also corrected another pricing issue that was resulting in other products such as throw pillows being priced incorrectly. Multiple news outlets published stories to debunk the theory. "

The viral social media posts frequently linked products to girls who were no longer missing. Multiple anti-trafficking groups said the claims were unproven and likely false. 

“We believe that the accusations being leveled against Wayfair regarding sex trafficking are lacking credibility in significant ways and, in many places, demonstrably false,” the National Center on Sexual Exploitation said at the time.

In 2020, VERIFY found that the family of Samara Duplessis, a missing girl purportedly linked to the overpriced pillows, reported she was back home a couple of months before the Wayfair conspiracy became widespread.

When VERIFY searched Wayfair for “Duplessis” products in 2020, we found the name attached to a number of different items that were considerably less expensive than the pillow. When VERIFY searched Wayfair’s site again on Dec. 2, 2024, we found it’s using the “Duplessis” name for at least one product, a rug selling for $144.99, years after the missing girl was found.

As for the reference to the cabinets in the original rumors, people claimed that there was a missing teenager from Ohio named Samiyah, too. But VERIFY was unable to find any evidence that a girl by that name was missing, and a teenager some people believed to be Samiyah refuted that she was missing in a video posted to her Facebook account.

Wayfair told the BBC in 2020 that the expensive cabinets were “industrial size,” meant for business or commercial use and that the $14,000 price point was accurate. 

“We have temporarily removed the products from our site to rename them and to provide a more in-depth description and photos that accurately depict the product to clarify the price point,” Wayfair told the BBC in 2020.

Another example of a missing teenager’s name possibly matching a Wayfair product was Mary Durrett to a Durrett coffee table. But she went missing in 2017 and was found safe two days after she was first reported missing. The claim connecting her to the coffee table listing was posted three years later. 

Many anti-trafficking organizations addressed the rumors in 2020. They all said the claims lacked credibility.

“We identified early on that this was a likely hoax or a case of overexuberance by someone who did not have the expertise and data-driven approach that DeliverFund has,” Michael Fullilove, chief of operations for DeliverFund, a nonprofit intelligence agency that uses technology to help law enforcement fight human trafficking, said in 2020.

“Based on the original source of the information, we were able to use open source intelligence techniques  to determine that it was highly unlikely that the trafficking of children was taking place through the sale of expensive items on Wayfair,” Fullilove said.

Polaris, which operates the U.S. National Human Trafficking Hotline, said the claims were unsubstantiated and did more harm than good. People overwhelmed the hotline to make reports related to the conspiracy, increasing wait times and potentially denying trafficking victims from reaching the hotline. The theory also resulted in harassment and privacy intrusions of people mistakenly believed to be victims, as well as broad sharing of online sexual abuse material of real victims never connected to the Wayfair conspiracy, Polaris said.

Polaris pointed out that trafficking is rarely perpetrated by a total stranger who kidnaps children and is instead usually perpetrated by people the victims know or even love and trust.

Scenarios where the trafficker locks up or imprisons the victim with literal shackles make up a minority of trafficking cases despite it being the common public perception of trafficking, the National Center on Sexual Exploitation said. Traffickers usually groom their victims and keep them captive through forms of psychological abuse, manipulation and coercion that can be difficult to identify.

There are real cases in which sex trafficking is perpetrated online, usually through prostitution sites and pornography websites, according to the National Center on Sexual Exploitation. 

The National Center on Sexual Exploitation said in 2020 that traffickers were increasingly using “popular social media apps such as Instagram, Snapchat and TikTok to identify, groom and exploit children in the online space.”

Anti-trafficking organizations say that sharing viral, unsubstantiated trafficking rumors online is generally unhelpful to trafficking victims. What’s more helpful, these organizations say, is to learn how to identify real, common cases of trafficking to spot victims who need help.