UK revenge porn victims nearly doubled in two years: Survey
LONDON : The number of British people who have been a victim of so-called revenge porn has almost doubled in the last two years, researchers said yesterday, calling the figure "deeply worrying".
Some 15 per cent between the ages of 18 and 45 surveyed by leading law firm Slater and Gordon said intimate sexual pictures of them had been shared without their consent - up from 8 per cent in 2019.
The firm said it was also shocked that nearly one in 10 people admitted they had shared or threatened to share an explicit image - more than twice the number in 2019.
One in five said they "wanted to scare" the victim. A quarter said it was "just a laugh", while a similar number deemed the image "their property" to share.
Motives included punishing someone for ending a relationship or trying to force someone to stay in a relationship.
"These numbers are deeply worrying," lawyer Holly Atkins. She said they had hoped revenge porn would have decreased as the issue became more widely discussed and condemned.
Women accounted for more than three-quarters of victims, according to the poll.
Britain, which outlawed the sharing of explicit images without someone's consent in 2015, announced this month that threatening to share such images would also be criminalised, with offenders facing up to two years in jail.
Of the 2,000 people surveyed, more than 40 per cent knew someone who had been a victim of revenge porn and 22 per cent knew someone who had been threatened. About 40 per cent of threats came from an ex-partner, 18 per cent from a friend and 11 per cent from a family member. - REUTERS
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