What is Intimate Image Abuse?
Intimate Image Abuse, also referred to as ‘Revenge Porn’, is the act of sharing intimate images or videos of someone, either on or offline, without their consent with the intention of causing distress. This is against the law and included in the Criminal Justice and Courts Act (2015).
What should I do next?
Get in touch for free, confidential support and assistance with reporting content that has been shared online. The helpline cannot guarantee removal of all images online but hold exceptional partnerships with industry partners. We're open Monday to Friday from 10am until 4pm. You can email us at any time and we will respond during our helpline opening times
Telephone
Call us on 0345 6000 459 we're open Monday to Friday from 10 am till 4pm.
We're here to help
We support all adults (those over the age of 18) in the UK who are victims of intimate image abuse and who have had their intimate images and videos shared without their consent, or when someone is threatening to do this.
- We provide non-judgemental and confidential advice via the phone or by email.
- If you have had intimate content shared online, we can help with the reporting and removal of content. Whilst we cannot guarantee removal of all images, we do hold a very good takedown record.
- We offer help and advice on the social media platform’s community guidelines and policies and how to report and remove content to which they should respond promptly. If not, we can help.
- We can give you advice on the UK law and provide information on reporting crimes to the police and the evidence you may need to gather.
- We have a referral relationship with the QMUL Legal Advice Centre who provide free legal advice for victims of intimate image abuse.
What advice we can offer
We are funded by the Home Office to provide support for victims of intimate image abuse, this includes the following areas:
In April 2015, the Criminal Justice and Courts Act made it, 'an offence for a person to disclose a private sexual photograph or film if the disclosure is made without the consent of an individual who appears in the photograph or film, and with the intention of causing that individual distress'.
Find out what to do if you have had your intimate shared without consent here.
Threats to share intimate images with the intent to cause distress is now included as an offence under the Domestic Abuse Bill in UK law.
Find out what to do if someone is threatening to share intimate images here.
Sextortion, also known as ‘webcam blackmail’, is when intimate images and videos are recorded and used for financial exploitation and coercion.
In the UK, it is a sexual offence called Voyeurism to record a private or sexual image or video of someone without their knowledge or consent for sexual gratification.
In 2019, upskirting was included in a subsection of voyeurism within the Sexual Offences Act (2003). Upskirting typically refers to the act of recording images under someone’s clothing of their buttocks, genitals or underwear in order to view it themselves or show it to someone else, without the consent of the person recorded.
StopNCII.org
The Revenge Porn Helpline and SWGfL have launched a new and ground-breaking platform: StopNCII.org.
StopNCII.org supports adults who are being threatened with the sharing of their private sexual images online. Unique identifiers, called hashes, are created of the images to prevent their spread across the platforms of participating industry partners. StopNCII.org allows adult users to create the hashes securely without the images leaving their devices and upload them to a central bank hosted by the Revenge Porn Helpline. The hashes are then shared and blocked by participating companies who have partnered with StopNCII.org.
Find more information on StopNCII.org here.
Intimate Image Abuse Podcast Episode
Five Year Report: Intimate Image Abuse, An Evolving Landscape
The Revenge Porn Helpline has now released their five-year report ‘Intimate image abuse, an evolving landscape’ looking at the period between 2015 - 2020. The report was presented at an exclusive online event and looked at the impact of intimate image abuse over the past five years and the support that the helpline has been able to provide.
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