A Public Library's Website Was Stolen & Turned Into A Sex Toy Store
A Virginia mom got a real surprise recently when she tried to visit her local library's website. Instead of being taken to a site with books, she ended up on a site displaying sex toys.
Heather Young, a mother of five, contacted the Hampton, Virginia library and the local news after she typed in the Hampton Public Library's website and was taken instead to a site calling itself the Hampton Adult Toy Store. The unexpected redirect had her concerned to say the least.
"I have five kids and I could just imagine if they had seen it instead of their mom," she said.
"I thought maybe I put in the wrong address so I double-checked, triple-checked and it was still sending me to the same page and it had explicit content."
Screenshot/Hampton Adult Toy Store
The adult toy store claims to be the "premiere destination for your adult toy needs." It also claims to have a wide variety of toys to choose from, but a closer look tells a different story.
As of now, the site doesn't have anything for sale, not that I was looking for anything. I just happened to take note of the fact that there were no toys for sale. The only thing on the site is a handful of articles about sex dolls.
Haven't Public Libraries Been Shutdown
The city of Hampton released a statement on the matter on Facebook. In the statement they point people to the correct url for the library and explain that the old url was stolen by someone posing as a city employee.
"Our research so far shows that someone impersonated a city employee, contacted our domain registration company, and transferred the old URL. We were never notified," part of the statement read.
"Hampton apologizes for this, but please know we were also duped or hacked. No one connected with the city had anything to do with this."
The most pressing question here has nothing to do with the stolen website. Or who is responsible for the Hampton Adult Toy Store.
What I want to know is - who is still going to the public library? And if you are still going to the library and using their website this is kind on you. Isn't it?