Former Ashley Madison employees admit security was 'put on the back burner' in explosive Netflix docuseries

Former Ashley Madison employees have admitted that security was 'put on the back burner' in Netflix's explosive new docuseries - and revealed the company's paid feature that promised to wipe accounts off the web was all a scam.

Back in 2015, millions of marriages were destroyed when a hacker leaked the names of every member who had signed up for controversial dating platform Ashley Madison.

Before the infamous hack, the website - which was designed to help married people cheat on their spouses - promised anonymity and privacy for its 37 million users.

CEO Noel Biderman continuously boasted about the company's commitment to protecting its members in interviews, and the website even contained a slew of badges that claimed it had earned awards for its impressive cybersecurity.

Back in 2015, millions of marriages were destroyed when a hacker leaked the names of every member who had signed up for controversial dating platform Ashley Madison

Before the hack, CEO Noel Biderman (seen) continuously boasted about the company's commitment to protecting its members in interviews

But now, ex Ashley Madison staffers have confessed that it was all a tactic used to get more customers in the new Netflix show, Ashley Madison: Sex, Lies, And Scandal.

They admitted that not only were the awards completely made up, but that the website didn't actually take any extra measures to protect its customers. 

Some also said that the service that allowed users to pay extra to have their accounts deleted was a cash grab that didn't really do anything.

'Security was something that came up quite frequently. We talked about it, we were worried about it, but it just kept falling to the back burner,' Amjit Jethani, former Ashley Madison director of product, dished in the doc.

He explained that the focus was more on 'keeping up with the growth' than protecting customers, and that many of the staffers 'understood' that a hack was a possibility.

'It was very well understood that if any of the web properties were hacked, it would have been almost catastrophic. The hope was that it wouldn't happen,' he stated.

At one point in the series, an old clip of CEO Noel praising the company's security measures in an interview was shown.

'Ultimately, our servers sit in a remote location so I think we're untouchable,' he said. 'We do everything we can to protect privacy.'

The website even contained a slew of badges that claimed it had earned awards for its impressive cybersecurity - but ex staffers admitted the awards were completely made up

Evan Back, who served as Ashley Madison's vice president of sales for nearly 10 years, said the medals were a 'complete misrepresentation'

'Security was something that came up quite frequently. We talked about it, we were worried about it, but it just kept falling to the back burner,' Amjit Jethani, director of product, added

Evan Back, who served as Ashley Madison's vice president of sales for nearly 10 years, called Noel a 'snake oil salesman' while reflecting on it. 

'We know [what he said] isn't true. The promise of security and anonymity and guaranteed safety was just something we said. It wasn't something we did,' he admitted.

'For people to run a company based on security and keeping clients secret but to have very little security, you're pushing it to the limit. 

'It was like, how far can I go before someone's going to come in and hack us? It was like gambling with people's lives.'

At the bottom of Ashley Madison's website was a picture of a medal and the words 'Trusted Security Award.' But according to journalist Claire Brownell, that was 'totally made up.'

'Somebody at the site must have made it using Photoshop or something,' she theorized. 

'We had all kinds of medals on our website, which gave the impression that we were rock-solid, airtight,' Evan said, adding that they were actually a 'complete misrepresentation.'

Joseph Cox - a reporter who studied every single thing that came out during the hack in great detail, including numerous private emails between Noel and his staffers - called Ashley Madison 'sloppy.'

Reporter Joseph Cox claimed that Ashley Madison's 'extra paid-for feature' that promised to erase all traces of a user off the site was all a complete lie

Evan explained, 'We would charge $20 to customers to permanently delete any record of them ever being members of Ashley Madison'

But an email from CEO Noel showed him confessing that they 'don't actually delete the accounts,' and admitting, 'We should provide the product paid for'

'It became clear that security seemed like an afterthought,' he revealed. 'Discussions that had a lot more effort put into them were about branding, about PR.'

While looking through all the files that were leaked, Joseph said he discovered that Ashley Madison's 'extra paid-for feature' that claimed it would erase all traces of a user off the site was all a complete lie.

'Ashley Madison advertised this extra paid-for feature, where if you gave the company more money and they promised to completely wipe your account,' he explained. 'There would be no evidence you ever used Ashley Madison.'

An image of an email from Noel the flashed across the screen, which showed him confessing that they 'don't actually delete the accounts,' and admitting, 'We should provide the product paid for.'

Evan explained, 'We would charge $20 to customers to permanently delete any record of them ever being members of Ashley Madison.

'I thought it was a great idea in the beginning. It brought in a lot of money, like a couple million dollars in a short period of time.

'What I didn't know was that we were charging, but we weren't doing it. Nothing was getting deleted.'

Joseph described the company not doing what it advertised as 'malicious and sketchy,' adding, 'Ashley Madison was ripping off customers.'

The Netflix docuseries - which features employees and former users - was released on May 15.