Prostitution in Hong Kong is itself legal, but organised prostitution is illegal, as there are laws against keeping a vice establishment , causing or procuring another to be a prostitute, living on the prostitution of others, or public solicitation. The most visible public venues for sex workers in Hong Kong, especially for tourists, are massage parlours and the so-called "Japanese style night clubs ". However, most of the commercial sex worker industry consists of women working in small, usually one room apartments, usually referred to as "one-woman brothels", the equivalent of the "walk-up brothel" in the United Kingdom.
They advertise for clients through the Internet and local classifieds. Most popular mainstream newspapers will carry such classifieds with brothel guides as an insert within racing form guides. This required all brothels to be registered and inmates to undergo regular health checks. In Hong Kong, with a population of ,, [8] boasted legal brothels with over 7, licensed prostitutes. From that time on, prostitution was permitted within strict limits while prohibiting a whole host of activities surrounding prostitution, such as soliciting for sex and living off "immoral earnings" working as a pimp.
Although organised prostitution is illegal, the industry had always been under the influence of triads to recruit economically disadvantaged women who otherwise would never enter the profession voluntarily. Until the s, most Hong Kong underground sex establishments were run by gangsters. As a result, gangsters could no longer make a profit by coercion and their controlling power declined. Lyndhurst Terrace and the surrounding area were the location of some of the earliest brothels established in Hong Kong, [14] in the midth century.
From to many brothels were declared by the Government to be unlicensed and closed down. To attract attention, brothels were displaying large street number plates, and the area became known as "Big Number Brothels".
Andrew and Bushnell wrote extensively on the position of women in the British Empire and the Tanka inhabitants of Hong Kong and their position in the prostitution industry, catering towards foreign sailors. The Tanka did not marry with the Chinese; being descendants of the natives, they were restricted to the waterways. They supplied their women as prostitutes to British sailors and assisted the British in their military actions around Hong Kong. Ordinary Chinese prostitutes were afraid of serving Westerners since they looked strange to them, while the Tanka prostitutes freely mingled with western men.
