Stripe apologizes for customer service agents claiming LGBTQ products were banned

Stripe, a financial services company that acts as a payment processor for millions of businesses including itch.io, has issued an apology following reports that members of its support team told callers the business does not support the sale of LGBTQ content.

“We apologize: the information given by our support team was totally wrong,” said Stripe spokesperson Casey Becker in an email to The Verge. “Stripe has no prohibitions on the sale of LGBTQ+ content or goods.”

“Twice today, when pressured, Stripe operators have said, plainly, that I cannot use Stripe for the purchase of LGBTQ content,” wrote Dieselbrain, a monsterkink artist on Bluesky. “Not just adult content, but explicitly LGBTQ.”

Others have shared recordings of calls where Stripe representatives say that it prohibits LGBTQ content. The Verge has reviewed one recording where a caller asks for clarification on whether Stripe allows LGBTQ content. The Stripe representative then says, “As far as we know, no. We restricted all that content three weeks ago.”

According to Becker, this is a mistake. “We’re looking into this and making sure future inquiries are answered correctly,” Becker said.