‘I felt powerless and alone’: Aussie authorities receive 350 revenge porn complaints in just six months
AUTHORITIES have received 350 revenge porn complaints in the past six months alone, as the problem grows — particularly among young people.
National
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EXCLUSIVE
AUSTRALIAN women and men are increasingly becoming victims of revenge porn, with more than 350 complaints to the office of the eSafety commissioner since October last year.
A special investigation by News Corp has gone inside the engine room of the fight against revenge porn which includes facial recognition software to ensure offending images can never be shared again.
News Corp was given unprecedented access to the team of cyber experts, private investigators and former police who are working to keep Australians safe online.
The crack team of eight spend their days looking at websites hosting illegal material from a locked secure room in a tower, overlooking Pyrmont in Sydney’s inner city.
They act on complaints from the public but also monitor websites like Aussie Sluts and shameyourex.com.
Of the 350 revenge porn complaints, the images appear on a mix of sources: forum, file sharing, image hosts, search engines, social media and websites.
And they involve victims from Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, and NSW. At least seven cases were referred by police, including VIC, NSW and AFP.
Investigators said those posting revenge porn images had two different motivations.
Half of those were motivated to cause harm or hurt to those in the images they were posting and the other half were simply motivated by sexual desires and disseminating candid porn.
Mostly men and teenage boys were the perpetrators however, a small proportion of women were also sharing images of men.
This is the first time the Office of eSafety has released figures on those Australians brave enough to reach out to authorities to get their most intimate images removed from porn websites and file sharing services.
And we can reveal a case involving a then 17-year-old Australian woman who at 20 was shocked to discover her naked pictures online and pressured by those close to her, including her boyfriend, to stay quiet and not report it.
The woman’s images were found on 14 different international websites and included her full name, school and comments about her sexual behaviour, with various members talking about sexual acts she had performed on them — none of which were true.
She had shared the pictures with a friend of a friend, pressured to show she had a “chilled, easy going personality”.
“At 17, she responded to a dare to share her photos; she wasn’t ashamed of her body and sent the photos with a laugh, not thinking about them after that night,” investigators told News Corp Australia.
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When she discovered the images she felt sick and powerless and completely alone.
She described the still very raw pain of having her friends and boyfriend feel more concerned about the abuser getting in trouble.
Investigators from the office of the eSafety commission managed to liaise with international counterparts to remove the images online.
Rose Cantali, childhood psychologist at PsychMatters, said teens felt enormous pressure to belong and so were increasingly sharing intimate images of themselves with others.
“I recently had a group of girls who were sending topless images of themselves to boys and didn’t think about the consequences,” Dr Cantali said.
“They think it is going to make them more popular or please their peers if they engage in that sort of behaviour and it is really dangerous. It is definitely getting worse.”
And for the investigators at the coalface, there is a cost.
They get regular ongoing training and counselling to manage the emotional load.
“It’s definitely extremely hard some days. You see the worst of society and some days it really hits you hard,” Sheona Colombage, 35, a private investigator in the team, said.
“On image-based abuse (revenge porn) we have to realise too that we just can’t save everyone.
“The majority of our IBA cases relate to women but men are victims of it too.”
News Corp Australia spent a morning with the team seeing how they work and hearing their stories.
One investigator recalled how she came across a revenge porn image of her friend’s niece in the course of their work.
“It is harder with image based abuse because now we can’t just dehumanise it, we are actually speaking with the victims or their teachers or colleagues and it’s much more real,” she said.
“We fully expect to see more and more of these cases as the problem is not going away and you can’t tell people to not share these images. It is just the culture now.”
ESafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant said it was the “harsh reality” for young women in particular to feel pressure to share intimate images of themselves.
“Research by Plan International and Our Watch reveals 51 per cent of women aged 15-19 are often pressured to take ‘racy’ photos (known as “intimate images”) of themselves and to share them,” Ms Inman Grant said.
She said it was important for all members of society to teach young people respect, particularly when it comes to sharing images online.
“We need to lead the way for our youth — to teach them that respect must be universal, and abuse is never acceptable.”
News Corp’s special investigation also comes as Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg will today announce his social media platform will crack down on revenge porn.
Users on Facebook, Instagram and Messenger can now report specific cases of revenge porn and a 24/7 team of experts will review the image and remove it.
Those involved in disseminating the image will face being kicked off the platforms and reported to police.
VICTIM FELT ‘POWERLESS AND ALONE’
AT 17, she shared two naked photos with a boy who was a friend of a friend.
They didn’t ever meet in person, they didn’t date. She explained to investigators that sharing photos is typical teen behaviour.
She said there was an expectation that photos would be shared by girls to show they had a “chilled, easy going personality”.
She did it as a response to a dare; she wasn’t ashamed of her body and sent the photos with a laugh, not thinking about them after that night.
Three years later her photos were found by a friend of her boyfriend while he perused an image sharing site.
He knew it was her because it had her full name and former school listed.
It also had messages about her sexual behaviour, with various members talking about sexual acts she had performed on them — none of which were true.
On the message boards she was objectified, vilified and dehumanised.
Her boyfriend and friends urged her not to take action. They didn’t want the boy that had shared the images or other friends who might have passed them along getting in trouble.
They didn’t feel that would be fair. She did her own investigation and found folders with images of three other girls she had been at school with. She contacted them but they didn’t want to act. They were scared of drawing more attention to the images and hoped by not acting the issue would eventually go away. They were ashamed.
She described the pain she felt at seeing her image being traded like a footy card, at seeing her image abused and dehumanised by anonymous people who made up lies, rated her body and used callous threats and abuse with abandon.
She felt sick and powerless and completely alone.
She described the still very raw pain of having her friends and boyfriend feel more concerned about the abuser getting in trouble.
The images have now been taken down, but she is hyper-vigilant.
She checks the message boards at least fortnightly and is particularly worried when her social media accounts have a sudden spike in interest, indicating somebody has found her images online and is hunting more ‘trophies’ to trade.
She has changed the way she communicates, the way she uses social media, and she is always watchful.
This has impacted her sense of safety. She feels hunted, she feels dehumanised. She knows the perpetrator has not had any similar repercussions — nor have those who anonymously share and comment on her image.
She considers herself very lucky not to have found the images until she was 20.
She thinks the outcome would have been very different had she found out at 17 — having to face school mates every day and trying to finish her final year of school.
It would have been much harder to cope had she been younger.
TROUBLING STATS
— Over 350 complaints of Australians who have found revenge porn images online this financial year.
— These have involved a mix of sources: forum, file sharing, image hosts, search engines, social media and websites.
— Location info not always available as in 80 per cent of cases reports are anonymous as victims are fearful of the repercussions on them.
Complaints received from people in VIC, QLD, SA, TAS, NSW
— We’ve received at least 7 cases referred by police, including VIC, NSW and AFP
— Many users who upload these images often post identifying details of the victim, such as what suburb or school/university they attend.
A VICTIM? WHAT TO DO
— Make a complaint with the URL to the eSafety commission. This can be anonymous.
— Secure your social media accounts. Make sure only people you know have access.
— Think about the consequences of sharing intimate images of yourself with others, even with people you trust.
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