Ashley Madison Sued By Ex-Employee Who Says She Hurt Herself Making Fake Profiles

The city that brought us Drake and Rob Ford is also now home to a woman suing her online dating site employer because making fake profiles damaged her wrists.

Doriana Silva sued Ashley Madison, the self-proclaimed leading dating service for married people seeking “discreet encounters,” alternatively known as cheating, for $20 million. In documents obtained by the Toronto Star, Silva claims that she was hired to work on a Brazilian version of the site, and the company asked her to create 1,000 fake profiles in three weeks.

“The purpose of these profiles is to entice paying heterosexual male members to join and spend money on the website,” the complaint reads. “They do not belong to any genuine members of Ashley Madison — or any real human beings at all.”

According to Silva, it was apparently kind of hard work. She claims that creating the profiles “required an enormous amount of keyboarding” that led to severe pain in her wrists and forearms. (Side note, what the hell is “keyboarding” and why does it sound really dirty? Like, “Gee, you look happy. What have you been up to?” “Oh, I was up all night keyboarding. Wink”)

So whatever “keyboarding” is, according to Silva, left her wrists and forearms in severe pain, which has kept her from working since 2011 and that’s kind of sad, really. And when you think about it, so much of this story is sad. Sad fake profiles. Sad website that arranges cheating. Kind of just feels like some 19th century Russian literature where everyone is alone and selfish and sad and suffering, no?

To be fair, none of this has been proven in court, and Ashley Madison hasn’t filed a formal statement of defense or anything of the kind. So remember, innocent until proven guilty kids.

For its part, Ashley Madison hasn’t responded to Fusion’s request for comment, but it did send Business Insider an assortment of photos showing Silva vacationing in bikinis. The company wrote: “In fact, in several postings Ms. Silva can be seen clearly enjoying herself on a jet ski – an unlikely activity for someone who has allegedly suffered serious injury.”

Oh, and Ashley Madison says on its site that it cannot “guarantee the authenticity of any profile,” warning that “anyone who is able to commit identity theft can also falsify a dating profile.” Good to know.