From selling skin to selling souls: Inside Kenya's underground 'nude' economy

A single leaked video was all it took. Within hours, the name Sheryl Gabriella was trending across Kenyan social media, her private content circulating far beyond any audience she had intended. The young woman, who has openly admitted to earning a living by sending nude photographs to subscribers on TikTok, suddenly found herself at the centre of a national conversation; one that stretches well beyond her own story.

It has since emerged that Sheryl's income depends heavily on gifts from her online audience: virtual "lions" and other TikTok gifting icons that convert directly into cash, alongside more tangible rewards from admirers eager to keep her attention. Her visible wealth and property, acquired largely through this trade, have only fuelled public fascination;  and public judgment.

But Sheryl is far from alone. The Nairobian has established that a growing number of young Kenyans are quietly building livelihoods around the sale of nudity and intimacy online, using platforms as varied as TikTok, Facebook, Telegram, WhatsApp and other online adult websites and dating sites.

For some, it is a side hustle. For others, it has become a full-time occupation, complete with its own informal rules, hierarchies and hazards.

Jane (not her real name), 31, and who lives in Nairobi, is one of many who have found steady income in what she describes as a discreet corner of the internet economy.

"I work in a discreet internet platform which entails entertaining men," she explains, adding, "Men will gift me for engaging them, sending nudes, doing sex virtually or simply sex chatting them." Her earnings scale with the intensity of the service. "Personally, I am paid for every chat. Sex activities are paid much higher," she says matter-of-factly, describing what has effectively become her profession.

For Jane, the work is transactional and, in her telling, largely unremarkable;  a job like any other, if an unconventional one.

Perhaps the most unexpected account comes from Jared (also not his real name), whose entry into the industry began with what looked, on the surface, like an ordinary job advertisement.

Business of deception

"I met dudes on Facebook who said they are looking for chat operators; people who are interested in representing our company as customer care attendants," Jared recalls.

Intrigued, he responded, and was soon sent a Telegram link. "Two days later, I joined the group to be trained, and we were trained through Google Meet."

What followed was not customer service in any conventional sense. "It happened that was about sex texting men looking for women on their platform," he discloses. Jared discovered that the platform used curated female profiles; "models," in industry parlance; that operators like himself were expected to impersonate.

"I don't understand why they couldn't put real people on those platforms, but since I was desperate for a job, I had to proceed," he admits.

The deception at the heart of the arrangement troubles him openly. After completing training, Jared set up an account using a female model's profile. "The irony is that the client is thinking that all along he is chatting with a lady, but it is me on the other end; a fellow man," he says.

The role occasionally demands more than text. "Sometimes a client has to look for sex videos, in which case I have to liaise with the administrators to find videos to align accordingly," Jared explains. He is also, at times, matched with clients seeking men. "Sometimes I get gay clients too, and though I find it disgusting, I have nothing else to do," he says, further revealing, "I get about 40,000 Kenyan shillings a month, and this is the money I use to cater for my family."

For Jared, the arrangement is less a choice than a compromise struck under economic pressure; a sentiment echoed by nearly everyone interviewed for this story.

Damaris, a university graduate who also asked that her real name be withheld, has built a five-year career selling explicit photographs and videos across social media and other online platforms.

"I have been doing this work for five years now. I know it is not good work, but you know there are no jobs in Kenya. What should I do, yet I need money?" she asks, framing her choice not as ambition but as necessity in an economy that has left many graduates without formal employment.

Her question; pointed, weary, and unapologetic; captures a tension that runs through each of these testimonies: the gap between moral discomfort and material survival.

Pastor's warning

Bishop Stephen Mwaura of Revelation Christian Church in Umoja views the phenomenon through the lens of social conformity and digital exposure.

"We are living in an age where many things are done through the internet. There is so much exposure, and many young people are influenced by social pressure and their peers," he says, adding  "They want to live like the rest, and so to catch up, they have to do weird things like engaging in weird sexual innuendos."

The bishop is careful to distinguish between explaining the behaviour and excusing it. He insists that young people require deliberate, sustained guidance about the long-term consequences of their choices.

"If you engage in sending nudes or engage in weird sexual activities, and then they get leaked in one way or another, this will leave a lifelong psychological imprint; not only on the affected person, but also on family and significant others," he warns.

He is equally direct with parents, urging them to remain closely involved in their children's lives both in and out of school. "Children are easily influenced by their peers and their interactions, and what gets into them may corrupt their minds to the point of engaging in weird behaviour," he says.

He also cautions against giving children unsupervised access to phones and laptops while at school, describing it as an avenue for corruption rather than convenience.

That caution is echoed in the experience of Justin Omari, a parent from Umoja, who believes unrestricted internet access reshaped his daughter's life in ways he never anticipated. He says she began identifying as a lesbian and engaging in behaviour he considers troubling only after he bought her a laptop. "She was not that way before," he says, attributing the shift to exposure she encountered online.

The psychology of selling  sex

Allan Lawrence, a certified counselling psychologist, offers a more clinical assessment of what sustained engagement in this economy can do to a person's inner life.

"Many people look at the money and forget to ask what the mind is paying for it," he says, adding  "No matter how the economy is doing, please hold onto your morals; it pays."

Lawrence explains that repeatedly monetising intimate parts of oneself, whether for survival or lifestyle, can carry psychological costs that extend well beyond one's bank balance. Human beings, he notes, naturally attach emotion, identity and self-worth to their bodies. When intimacy becomes a commodity, the mind often creates distance in order to cope; a process psychologists describe as emotional detachment or compartmentalisation, in which a person separates their feelings from their actions simply to keep functioning.

The risk, he warns, is that what starts as "just business" can gradually reshape self-perception. Some individuals experience self-objectification, coming to see themselves primarily through the eyes of paying consumers rather than as whole people. Over time, this can erode self-esteem, complicate trust, and make emotional intimacy and long-term relationships harder to sustain.

There is also the psychological weight of permanent exposure. The internet, as Lawrence points out, rarely forgets. The persistent fear that private content could be leaked, shared or weaponised can produce chronic anxiety, hypervigilance and emotional exhaustion. Living with the knowledge that today's income could become tomorrow's public humiliation places sustained strain on the nervous system.

Still, Lawrence resists simplistic conclusions. Not everyone who takes this path experiences identical outcomes; personality, coping mechanisms, support systems, financial pressure and past trauma all shape how individuals are affected. For some, the decision stems not from desire but from economic desperation, coercion, or a lack of viable alternatives. Understanding that context, he stresses, does not amount to approving of the behavior; but it does allow for a more humane response than ridicule.

Beyond morality: A question of meaning

The conversation sparked by cases like Sheryl Gabriella's, Lawrence argues, should not begin and end with moral judgment. When survival depends on monetising one's privacy or sexuality, society is compelled to ask harder questions; about economic opportunity, mental health support, digital safety, and the value it places on human dignity in an increasingly online world.

Every source of income, he notes, carries both a financial return and an emotional cost. The more important question, he suggests, is not simply "how much did I earn?" but "what did this work slowly teach me to believe about myself?" Some ventures pay the bills while quietly eroding peace of mind and long-term wellbeing.

As Kenya's youth continue navigating a difficult job market alongside an ever-expanding digital economy, the stories of Sheryl, Jane, Jared and Damaris offer a sobering reminder: where one stands today, financially and otherwise, often shapes where one will sit tomorrow. It is a caution worth heeding before venturing into territory as sensitive, and as consequential, as this.