What to Do If You Are a Victim of Revenge

In 2010, Taylor made a phone call that, at least temporarily, blew up her life. Someone posted nude photos of her on a revenge pornography site called IsAnyoneUp.com and sent the link to her former employer. A friend of hers, who was dating her former boss, called her to tell her about it. “So it all started with a former employer who had already seen [the pictures],” says Taylor, whose last name has not been released for confidentiality reasons. “I started having a full-scale panic attack on the phone as soon as she called me.”

Taylor, now 29, called the site administrator, a man named Hunter Moore, and demanded that her photograph be removed. “He laughed at me,” she says. “I started crying on the phone. He told me, “When you act like a whore, you are treated like a whore,” and that he “teaches whores a lesson.”

When she told Moore that the photographs were taken when she was 16 and that he was technically distributing child pornography, he got scared and agreed, telling her that he hoped she had “learned her lesson.” But the damage was done. “As soon as I hung up with him, my email and text inboxes were filled with messages from guys I hadn’t heard of in months and years, and from former colleagues,” Taylor says. “They didn’t turn to me for support, but told me:“ I saw you naked this morning. ” She discovered that her photos had already been posted on four other websites, so she started looking for what she could do to get them down. “There were no revenge porn laws at the time,” she says. “I didn’t know if I could go to the police. I was afraid that I would be accused of taking the picture. “

Taylor felt lonely, but he is not. About one in eight Americans on social media are victims of revenge porn, according to a nationwide study by the nonprofit online human rights group Cyber ​​Civil Rights Initiative . Although the distribution of pornography without the consent of the victim persecutes people of all genders, women are disproportionately affected and are about 1.7 times more likely to be victims than men. Despite its widespread prevalence, the laws governing revenge pornography are unclear and vary from state to state.

But there are ways to combat revenge pornography and its perpetrators through legal means and advocacy groups working to combat this type of cybercrime. Here’s what you can do if this happens to you.

Breathe

The moment you find out that your personal images are in the public domain, your anxiety can spiral around. While this may seem like trivial advice, the most important thing to do first is to catch your breath. “Nobody told me that, and when I first saw my pictures, I immediately panicked,” says Taylor. “You really feel like your world is crumbling before your very eyes. But this is what you can get through. More support is available now than ever. “

Collect your resources

One such means of support is the aforementioned Cyber ​​Civil Rights Initiative . In addition to hosting a research checklist, victims’ FAQs , online removal guides, attorney lists, and other legal referrals, CCRI has a 24/7 emergency service staffed with mental health professionals for people who need to speak with someone immediately. , whether because they feel unsafe, prone to suicide, or just want to hear a voice on the other end of the line. “We have a number of resources on our site, depending on what works for you,” said Dr. Mary Ann Franks, CCRI vice president, director of legislative and technical policy and professor of law at the University of Miami School of Law. “We will help you understand what you think you should do or what you can do as soon as you understand that it is not your fault and you are not alone.”

If you’re looking for comprehensive guidance on the practical steps to take, Without My Consent is a nonprofit that educates lawyers and defenders on online harassment laws and provides victims with resources and guidance they can use to fight on their own. The group “Something can be done!” The guide is essentially a one-stop center for clarification on restraining orders, retention of evidence, copyright registration, mental health counseling, and even pre-filled forms, digital abuse law cheat sheets, and specific things you can quote if you find that argue Your case will be sent to a judge in the near future.

“We’re trying to communicate that this is being done to empower victims to create communities of helpers on the ground in their districts,” said Lifehacker Erica Johnston, co-founder and vice president of Without My Consent.

And if you need a virtual shoulder to lean on, there is BADASS Army , a relatively new non-profit organization dedicated to helping victims and survivors of revenge pornography. Founder Kaitlyn Bowden started the group in August 2017, months after someone uploaded nude photos of her to the xHamster porn site.

Now Bowden and the other BADASS are scouring the Internet for revenge pornography, warning anyone they can if they find their photos and videos along with any identifying information. They can help identify criminals by capturing their IP addresses; advise on legal countermeasures; and help victims find lawyers available.

At least, or perhaps most importantly, the BADASS army connects new victims with survivors – an all-volunteer group staffed with people who have discovered their own photos and videos posted online, and this can be incredibly useful, even if just talk to someone who has gone through this experience themselves. BADASS has a private Facebook group, Twitter account and email address, and they will usually get back to you quickly, even if you reach out to you in a panic in the middle of the night.

Rachel, the group’s 25-year-old volunteer who asked not to disclose her last name for privacy reasons, has been dealing with her own online images for nearly a decade. “I did it all by myself before BADASS, and it’s a very lonely battle,” she says. “We can be your friends, allies and protectors. It’s amazing to see these women flourish with a little support. “

Collect evidence

The first section in “Something Can Be Done Without My Consent!” leadership includes collecting and preserving evidence. This includes: 1) the date of the incident, 2) what happened, 3) evidence that it happened, 4) who do you think did it, 5) evidence that they did it, and 6) the evidence you still need and information about who might have had it. This. Include screenshots of web pages that include visible URLs, printouts, text messages with names and specific dates and times, PDFs, voicemails, and anything else you can comfortably swear on in court if this happens … to that. Make copies of everything. There is even a handy sample checklist that you can download as a Word document.

After you’ve collected the evidence, Johnston recommends putting it into one folder. “Then you have a folder that is your declaration that you can take to your local police station, you can take it to your local attorney or an injunction clinic,” says Johnston. “The Evidence Table makes your first interactions with people who can help you really positive.”

Ask websites to remove your photos / videos

Now that you have a bunch of evidence, your next priority is probably to get your images off the Internet. The good news is that it is much easier to do this now than it used to be. “Many large reputable companies simply agree to close this business under their terms of service,” says Johnston. “There are now automated web portals for that, just like you report copyright infringement, you provide a URL and the platform fixes it.”

This is especially true for major social networks like Facebook and Instagram. Lawyer Lisa Bloom represented Black Chin’s model this summer after her ex-boyfriend Rob Kardashian posted sexually explicit photos of her on Instagram and Twitter. “Instagram removed the photos pretty quickly, and they also deleted his entire Instagram account,” Bloom tells Lifehacker. Twitter also removed the photos, but did not deactivate his account. “This is an example of how different sites handle them differently.”

Legal pornographic sites like Pornhub will also remove any videos or photos uploaded without consent (you can submit a request through their content removal portal ). Of course, some websites, such as the now defunct IsAnyoneUp.com, or anonymous download sites such as Anon-IB, are specifically targeting revenge pornography and are much less likely to respond to a simple request to remove content.

If you are dealing with one of these sites, it is best to comply with copyright laws. This is where the Digital Millennium Copyright Act or DMCA comes in handy. This law, signed by President Bill Clinton in 1998, makes it illegal to reproduce your intellectual property on the Internet, including any photos or videos you take that someone else uploads.

“If you are a victim and this is a selfie, then you own the copyright. Usually, the copyright belongs to the person who takes the picture. If someone else took the picture, you need to get a written assignment, ”explains Johnston. A good resource here is DMCA Defender , an affordable service that will work to remove pornographic content from websites for a small fee.

You can also submit a DMCA request of your choice – Pinterest has a template to match – which you must submit by certified mail or email with a read receipt. Another option is to contact the person who you think uploaded the video. “I would send them a very convincing letter by certified mail, or if it’s an e-mail, then by e-mail with a read receipt, and I would say, ‘As you know, I did not consent to this.’ I object to this. It is a crime. I demand that you take it off immediately and never do it again, ”says Bloom. This can scare them so much that your photos will be left out. If not, then maybe it’s time to hire a lawyer and we’ll get to him in a minute. But before that …

Should I go to the police?

On the one hand, having a police report is helpful, especially if you eventually decide to take legal action. For example, if you are dealing with a site like Pornhub: “I would go to the police, file a report with the police, save a copy, send the police report to the website and say,“ I did go to the police. about it.’ I think it will strengthen it and make them take off, ”says Bloom. After all, the more evidence you have in your folder, the more convincing your case will be.

On the other hand, law enforcement officials are not necessarily well educated when it comes to the devastating consequences of porn revenge, and they may not take your case seriously. “Some of them see it as a laughing factor, like, ‘Oh, nude photos, haha, that’s funny,” Bloom says. “And it’s not funny, girls are killing themselves because of this.”

In fact, in some cases, the police can aggravate the situation. “I wish I could tell the victim with confidence, ‘They’ll take you seriously and treat you with respect, and they’ll put it all on record so they can help you,’” Franks says. But she and other cybercrime attorneys say clients not only have a useless law enforcement experience, but one that Frank says has “re-traumatized” them. “You show them pictures and they show them to friends in the office,” says Frank. “Or you have a 16-year-old girl who thinks you’ll help her and you look at her and tell her,“ Since you took this photo and sent it to your boyfriend, you are guilty of distributing child pornography. … “We’re still not in a place where law enforcement treats people with dignity.”

If you are unsure of what to do, it is worth discussing your situation with the CCRI Hotline, with non-profit cybercrime organizations such as the Online SOS Network , or with a cybercrime lawyer. Which brings us to …

Hiring an attorney

Here’s the bad news. Hiring a lawyer can be quite costly, and while lawsuits can sometimes pay high payouts – for example, earlier this month a California court ruled $ 6.4 million in a revenge pornography case – most people won’t see much money, if at all. see nothing. … “For most people, participation in lawsuits is prohibitively expensive, and even if you really do litigate and you can get a serious court decision, unless you have a defendant with deep pockets, this decision is worth the paper on which it was written,” Johnston. is talking. “I had this experience early in my practice, when we filed a complaint against the default decision in the Los Angeles Supreme Court, and even though we received over a million dollars in compensation for online reputation damage, I don’t think that our client has ever collected based on this decision. “

Many defendants know in advance that the threat of legal action will not necessarily harm them, making them difficult to prosecute in states that do not have criminal laws against revenge porn. Few states have strict (or any) such laws. California’s laws are the strictest: criminal, civil, and family laws can help you fight revenge pornography. There, you can get an immediate restraining order in family court that will force websites using your image to remove them. Outside California, however, it can be difficult to know which route to take. Without My Consent has detailed guidance on the state’s civil, criminal, and family laws governing revenge pornography, but note that only New York, Michigan, New Jersey, Virginia, and Washington have sufficiently stringent e-crime laws and law enforcement agencies so that they can be accepted. collect.

You can file a DMCA violation letter (and in California, file the aforementioned restraining order in family court with instructions here ) without the help of a lawyer. But if you can’t get criminals to delete your photos / videos yourself and can afford to talk to a layman, especially if you are located outside a resource-rich state like California, then this is not a bad idea. contact a civilian attorney who understands Internet laws.

“It’s important that people who are victims of revenge porn speak to lawyers who understand the nuances of what’s going on,” says Lifehacker K. Harles Mudd , a Chicago-based civilian attorney who specializes in the Internet. “You need someone who understands how some of these websites work, their nuances, features and approaches to them. You will also need an attorney who understands the aspects of electronic discovery, how to know what to ask for and how to do it. “

A lawyer can have a “lighter touch” if and when you need to take your case to court, Johnston said. “Often my clients come to my law firm because they want to get the criminal to stop, leave, remove the content, and they want to move on without creating a paper trail of what happened. When a lawyer is brought in to you, we understand a little more about how we work with the court. ” Lawyers can help escalate termination and abstinence letters, pressure uncooperative websites if necessary, and try to resolve disputes early, which is much cheaper than litigation. “A good lawyer can be very helpful in such cases,” says Johnston.

If you cannot afford the services of a private lawyer, groups such as Without My Consent and the SOS Network on the Internet can put you in touch with legal aid lawyers in your area. CCRI’s Cyber ​​Civil Rights Legal Project is an initiative led by law firm K&L Gates that will provide victims of pornography with free legal aid. CCRI also has a list of lawyers on their website who similarly take on the services of free revenge porn clients. If you decide to see a lawyer, be sure to bring your evidence folder with you.

How to handle

Whether you’re going to the police, pursuing a lawsuit, or sending enough emails to get your photos taken yourself, you still have to deal with the fact that your intimate images were originally online. It is helpful to seek advice (Without My Consent has resources to do this, as does the CCRI 24/7 hotline), and to speak with survivor groups such as the BADASS army to combat feelings of paranoia and anxiety.

Army founder BADASS Bowden fought after her photos went viral. Although they were originally uploaded to only one site, like Taylor’s photographs, they ended up on sites all over the Internet. With the help of a friend who worked in information technology, Bowden was able to quickly get rid of most of them, but the psychological effects were long lasting. “I was terrified. I was paranoid and humiliated, says Bowden. “I didn’t want to go out in public. Anyone who looked at me for more than a second or two, I just assumed they saw me naked. “

But try to remind yourself that this is not as compelling as it sounds. “Just remember that these sites are niche platforms. Not everyone saw [your images], ”says Bowden. “At some point, this is just another really bad part of your life that you will look back on.”

While much of porn revenge is an attempt by the perpetrator to dishonor their victim, there is nothing to be ashamed of. “What is this, is this your nude image? Okay, you have a body under your clothes. Everyone does it, says Bloom. “This is just a sex tape. Normal adults have sex, there is nothing to be ashamed of. He is the kind of person who should be ashamed of what he has done. “

Bloom notes that while it may seem like everyone on earth has seen you naked, not many people have actually seen you. “We all take our stuff very seriously. We are not very versed in other people’s things. In fact, not all people look at your images, ”she says. “It will be a flash. It will recede into the rearview mirror of your life. You have to keep going, and what you do will define you, not what someone else has done to you. “

How to help fight for others

Some victims tell Lifehacker that one of the best things that helped them recover from their hassles with porn revenge was that they became lawyers themselves.

“One of the survival skills is to do everything you can to prevent this from happening to other people. You seem to be changing something, ”Bowden says, noting that many BADASS members volunteer for this very reason. “This is the only justice they will see. If they are not going to seek justice in their particular case, they want to help others, ”she says.

One of Johnston’s primary goals is to bring more collective attention to the lack of comprehensive revenge porn laws in many states, especially in light of the recent #MeToo movement, which has helped shed light on the issues of consent and sexual abuse. “With all the attention given to these issues of abuse and harassment, how can we achieve this in democratic engagement?” She encourages interested supporters to look at the Assess Your Condition checklist without my consent to see where they are failing. “We know what these ingredients are. This is a recipe, and then everything depends on the democratic participation of citizens who send a message to their attorney general that the investigation of electronic crimes is important for the citizens of this state. “

In fact, the #MeToo movement has helped fuel the conversation about revenge pornography. While this is not sexual assault or rape in the traditional sense, it is a violation that stems from the same social confusion around (or refusal to acknowledge) consent. “This crime depends on a culture that does not prioritize consent and prioritizes sexual shame,” says Taylor. “Sometimes I wonder if this crime would have existed if we had given women the right to bodily and sexual autonomy.”

Please note: Just because you are sending someone your photo without your clothes on does not mean that you have agreed to send that photo to everyone on the Internet. “People don’t seem to understand sexual consent,” Franks says. “They really seem to be thinking, ‘Well, she had sex with me, so I had the right to take a picture of her.’ She gave me permission to take a picture of her so that I could post it on your website. ” This is incredibly disturbing. “

After all, as Franks points out, “If you think a woman has no right to give it up, then you probably think she has no right to give up many other things.”