Social Media

Inside India’s thriving NSFW livestream black market

Nikhil Patwardhan

May 07, 2025 | 14 Min Read

On encrypted channels across Telegram, Reddit, and Discord, Indian youth are recording, repackaging, and reselling NSFW livestreams from platforms like Tango Live—powered by UPI payments, digital anonymity, and a regulatory vacuum too slow to catch up.

Key Takeaways

A shadow resale economy around NSFW livestreams is thriving in India, driven by resellers who pirate premium content and distribute it via Telegram, Discord, and Reddit
Resellers operate with professional efficiency, using multi-screen setups, external hard drives, bots, and anti-piracy tools to manage and monetise stolen content
Frictionless UPI payments, low costs, and psychological triggers like anonymity and instant gratification have enabled this shadow marketplace
Despite occasional takedowns by platforms like Telegram, the absence of clear regulations and enforcement mechanisms in India allows these networks to grow unchecked

On a humid evening in Pune, a 21-year-old commerce student toggles between two screens. On one, a topless woman dances to muffled reggaeton on a Tango Live stream. On the other, a Telegram bot spits out UPI QR codes, payment confirmations, and links to invite-only resale groups. Within seconds, he saves a screen recording, zips it with a password, and uploads it to a private Discord server with over 1,700 members. By midnight, he’s sold access to 38 people—each paying Rs 99.

“I made more in one night than I did working a month at my cousin’s cafe,” he told The CapTable on condition of anonymity. “It’s a simple hustle. People want the content, and I just make it easier to get.”

This quiet digital flip—an increasingly normalised practice among Indian youth—has evolved into a parallel content economy. At the centre of it is NSFW livestreaming content from apps like Tango Live, Bigo, and a growing host of adult-friendly platforms.

When Tango was briefly removed from app stores in India, informal resale markets filled the void. Telegram, Reddit, Instagram, and Discord stepped in as unofficial distributors.

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