Kaho Shibuya's Uncensored JAV Leaks Lawsuit Shakes The Industry

The following are ZENRA's admin thoughts about the recent lawsuit by Shibuya Kaho.

While this sounds more like a ‘porn story’, it’s more of the plaintiff (Kaho) claiming the defendants (studio plus production crew – information isn’t totally clear here) mismanaged data which resulted in the leak of some uncensored masters a few years ago (raw footage including “cut!”, “scene start!”, etc.).  

On one hand, I agree with Kaho in that surely somebody was negligent with data, but whether she has the tools and resources to prove to a judge that one or more of the defendants is dead to rights when it comes to the mismanagement claim will be tough. This, I believe, is a civil suit and going by the relatively low amount she is suing for, the chances of her being able or even wanting to fully fund a legal team seem doubtful.

The amount she is suing for is about $70K USD which, going by the Yahoo article, was calculated in a somewhat haphazard way seemingly based on what her agency was paid before her cut times ten ($6K or so). Her reasoning is the leaks have financially harmed her reputation and this is a claim I think anyone with or without a legal mind may find hard to believe given how, if anything, her fame post-JAV has been on a continuous upward trend: Twitter followers higher than ever, Twitch subscriptions rising and rising (her pre-tax income last year has been estimated to be around half a million USD), and a very busy Con schedule. She even notes that she has heavy popularity abroad and as we’ve seen in the past how sex tapes have boosted careers of celebrities, the cards I believe are stacked against her when it comes to successfully winning this suit for the amount she desires at least.

With that said, this sounds more like a publicity stunt to get her more exposure. I don’t view that as a negative on its own as unlike other former JAV stars who still keep their stage names and remain in semi-NSFW public eye, she has mostly not delisted her content. However, given the recent passing of a certain law, the AV industry has been a punching bag and another attack on it now is the last thing it needs (and really, the leak was almost two years ago yet her reason for only deciding to sue now is odd).

The most likely end result is probably one of two things: the suit never happens. The peak is this press conference and that’s that. Or the suit does happen, it hastily goes to arbitration where the plaintiff receives perhaps $6K from the studio (gross performance fee) and both sides agree never to talk about it again.