Silicon Valley’s secret “pervert list” was just the beginning.
Eleven more women have come forward to report sexual assaults in the tech world since The Post revealed last week that there was a spreadsheet circulating in Silicon Valley with the names “over 100” alleged sexual predators, including “prominent investors and businessmen.” The alleged victims said they wanted to share their stories and be added to the list.
“There are these men in tech who are acting as power brokers and sexual abusers, trading favors, and covering up for each other,” a Silicon Valley insider with knowledge of the tech community told The Post.
“I do really see this as an Epstein-like network, where there’s a lot of abusers who basically work with each other … But we’re actually just at this point looking at the tip of the iceberg.”
One woman who came forward claims the man she accused hacked her phone and used her confidential information and strategy against her.
Another woman, a former private banker, told The Post she reported a sexual assault by a colleague at a bank in Singapore, was fired and saw the case closed without a chance to submit new evidence. The man faced no consequences, she said. She has since moved to the Middle East and cannot find work.
“Nobody will hire me anymore,” she said, crying.
Tracy DeTomasi, CEO of Callisto, a San Francisco nonprofit that built an online platform connecting survivors who potentially had the same attackers, said women desperately need a way to share information about potential perpetrators.
“Women are trying to find a way to protect themselves. Who’s trying to stop the men?” she told The Post.
“Because we can only protect ourselves so much. We need a solution that really changes companies’ approaches to getting rid of toxic, abusive offenders. And that’s not happening right now. It’s not happening in tech, it’s not happening in universities, it’s not happening in government, it’s not happening anywhere.”
“You might not be the one that’s sexually assaulting somebody, but are you laughing when it happens? Are you doing business deals with this person?” she added.
Those who speak up about powerful men do so at great risk.
“They’re dealing with people with a lot of money,” the insider told The Post. “People [are] getting tracked, people’s homes getting broken into … things getting hacked, surveilled.”
Sadly, Callisto, which launched in 2018 and let survivors anonymously log the name of an attacker and be connected with other victims, stopped accepting new users in July when it announced it was closing. About 4,000 survivors had opened accounts. Existing users can still log in to download or delete their records.
“There’s no money in sexual assault. There really just isn’t,” DeTomasi said. “So many rape crisis centers are going away. So many victim advocacy organizations have had significant funding cuts.”
Callisto’s users weren’t limited to women; 13% percent were men claiming they’d been the victims of sexual assault.
The insider said some predators exploit the mentoring culture in the Bay Area’s gay community, where relationships can shift from care to coercion. “There are people who come in and start using this transactionally, start handing out money or opportunity … And then suddenly it starts to change into a power relationship.”
The owners of the original Silicon Valley list did not want their details shared, citing concerns about privacy and having their information hacked or stolen.
Numerous versions of these lists have been compiled across the Bay Area over time, but their potential for smears and spreading often-unverified allegations means they have to be carefully policed.
In 2017, another list — dubbed “Shitty Media Men” and focusing on men in journalism and publishing, mostly on the East Coast — grew to more than 70 before its creator, Moira Donegan, took it down after about 12 hours.
One of the men on the list, author Stephen Elliott, denied the allegations against him and sued Donegan for defamation in federal court in Brooklyn in 2018. The case was settled in 2023 for what he said was a six-figure payment.
There are limited resources dedicated to preventing sexual violence and supporting those who have experienced it in California.
Only 16 organizations in the state receive funding dedicated to preventing sexual violence in the first place, according to David S. Lee, Deputy Director of VALOR , the coalition of California’s rape crisis centers. “We do not see the level of commitment necessary to properly support survivors and address the high rates of violence,” he said.
Bay Area Women Against Rape in Oakland, one of the nation’s oldest rape crisis centers, closed last year after 54 years. Its state funding has since been redirected to other programs in Alameda County, according to ValorUS.
Those who have contacted The Post about being sexually assaulted have been referred to police where appropriate and to support services. Survivors in California can find their local rape crisis center through the Get Help map at valor.us.
One tech worker who came forward said: “We need another MeToo movement for the tech community.”
