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An Image Site Is Victimizing Countless Women and Little Can Be Done (vice.com)

Allison Tierney, reporting for Vice: An international anonymous photo-sharing site where people post explicit photos without consent is playing host to the victimization of countless women. In the Canadian section of Anon-IB alone, there are currently over a hundred threads -- often organized by region, city, or calling out for nudes of a specific woman to be posted publicly. "Hamilton hoes," "Nanaimo Thread!," and "Markham wins" are some titles of Canadian threads. (Language used on the site equates the word "win" with sexually explicit photos of women.) Many major Canadian cities are represented on the site, and some threads even focus on women from specific schools. While it's a crime to share an "intimate image" of a person without their consent in Canada, sites that host this kind of activity don't necessarily fall under this. "[In terms of organizing content], is it criminal? No. Is it illegal? No," Toronto-based lawyer Jordan Donich, of Donich Law, told VICE. "It's a newer version of an older problem -- sites like these have been around for a long time." Anon-IB is not a new site; its current domain was registered to a "private person" in 2015 and ends in an ".ru." However, the site was initially up several years before 2015, going offline briefly in 2014.

15 of 273 comments (clear)

  1. Don't pose nude by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    does that help?

    1. Re:Don't pose nude by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Is it really victim blaming if the cold-hearted truth and reality of the situation is this will continue to exist and the "victim" shares their personal pictures with the wrong type of person freely?

    2. Re:Don't pose nude by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      you can do both you realise?

      It's like leaving your door unlocked in a rough neighborhood, then getting robbed.

      You are still a victim, and the robber still deserves the full punishment of the law. but just because you put yourself in a POTENTIAL situation, doesn't mean that someone exploiting it is without blame.

      Fuck that site.

    3. Re:Don't pose nude by AmiMoJo · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Not really... This is just the latest problem. Paparrazi taking photos of celebrities on their private property through a zoom lens has been happening since zoom lenses were invented. It's getting worse with the availability of cheap drones.

      We need to decide if we want private spaces and if privacy is to be enforced by high walls and anti-aircraft guns, or some other means.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    4. Re:Don't pose nude by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Many of the photos were taken without permission. Even if permission were given to take a picture, that should not automatically include permission to distribute it. In some cases, the photos were copied by technicians from laptops or phones that were being serviced.

      You may feel that women "deserve" abuse if they are not sufficiently chaste, but you may feel different if it is your GF, sister, or daughter.

      The failure of the law to deal with this issue invites vigilante action. In my neighborhood a young man posted explicit pictures of his ex-girlfriend, and was hospitalized after a severe beating by an unknown assailant. His GF's four older brothers denied involvement.

    5. Re:Don't pose nude by gfxguy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It's not about victim blaming, it's about prevention - you can make yourself NOT be a victim if you're not comfortable with the world seeing you nude by NOT POSING NUDE. That doesn't mean the people that violate your trust aren't guilty (of at least violating your trust, if not something illegal).

      Hey, if I leave my car unlocked and someone steals something inside it, the scumbag who stole my stuff is still guilty - but I could have limited my chances of being a victim if I'd have locked my doors. It's an unfortunate side of society that we need to expend resources keeping people from violating our rights, but it is the way it is.

      --
      Stupid sexy Flanders.
    6. Re:Don't pose nude by alvinrod · · Score: 4, Interesting

      The problem is that no matter how good of a defense you have, someone will find a way through it. Eventually satellites will become cheap enough and cameras good enough to capture candid shots from space. High walls and personal anti-aircraft guns already sounds like some kind of crazed libertarian fantasy land, and I can't imagine anti-satellite missiles being added to the mix makes it any more reasonable.

      Besides, once the information is out there there's no putting the genie back in the bottle. Even assuming there were, the kind of technology that could theoretically allow you to do just that would give authoritarian governments the kind of control over information that not even Orwell could have imagined. That's far more terrifying then the rest of the world being able to see me naked.

      I think it would be far better for humanity to get over their puritanical penchants (which in some cases they're just pretending to have so they can feel morally superior) and accept that people like to fuck. People on nude beaches don't seem to give much care to the other naked people around them, and for what it's worth I think it would do a lot of good for people to see that most people don't look like air-brushed models which has led to a lot of people having issues with body image.

  2. No Links? by sycodon · · Score: 4, Funny

    WTF dude?

    --
    When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
    1. Re:No Links? by PopeRatzo · · Score: 4, Funny

      I've been here before but just via some Google result accidently.

      I know, right? I told my wife the same thing and she still threw a plate at my head.

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.
  3. How is this news? by icedcool · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This is an opinion piece, about outrage and victimization. How is this tech?
    Why do we have this on slashdot news?

    --
    Most people aren't thought about after they're gone. "I wonder where Rob got the plutonium" is better than most get.
  4. Re:Stop going after the site by Kiuas · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Indeed. It's not illegal to post nude pictures of someone (in most western countries), however at least here in Finland there exists case law which has deemed quite clearly that publishing such photos without the consent of the person in them is a violation of privacy. It doesn't matter that you agreed to be photographed, or even took and sent the pictures yourself, that does not grant the receiver the right to redistribute them.

    The site is not violating the law, but the people who are posting pictures without permission are.

    --
    "It is the business of the future to be dangerous" -Alfred North Whitehead
  5. Re:also, little can be done by AmiMoJo · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Even if people didn't take the photos themselves, there have always been people trying to point cameras at beaches or up skirts and then masturbate over them. I guess you can argue "don't wear those clothes if you don't want to risk this happening" but most people prefer a society where women don't have to wear burkas just to avoid becoming part of some internet porn site.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  6. Re:Thanks Vice... by Baron_Yam · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I'm probably crazy, but I think maybe the world would be a better place if the response was, "That girl was an enthusistic partner, shame the guy turned out to be an asshole".

    Most of us have sex. Most of us appreciate a willing, enthusiastic partner we feel we can trust. Why do so many look down on the woman with cum on her face instead of the dick that put it there?

  7. Wrong analogy by s.petry · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Perhaps you should investigate the difference between Criminal and Civil actions. Lets see if we can reason through this, using money since you hinted at it.

    A better analogy (IMHO) would be that you and your roommate have a jug and each of you drops money into the jug. One day you come home from work and see a note that your roommate hates you, and moved out while you were at work. You happen to notice that the jug you both put money into is no longer full, and is at roughly half.

    Did your roommate commit a crime? If you related this factually: A police officer and DA would tell you no, that you could not prosecute and that there was no criminal action. You could however take them to civil court if you feel that they took more than their fair share and try to get the difference in what you feel was rightly yours versus theirs.

    You voluntarily shared your money in the same pile as theirs. The outcome you got was probably not what you wanted, but without your actions the outcome would not have been possible.

    Now if a person feels wronged and wants to sue the person uploading the pictures, I'm fine with that. Making a voluntary exchange criminal because someone changes their mind after the fact, not fine. We are all accountable for our actions and any repercussions that arise from our actions. The better our choices the safer and better the outcomes tend to be.

    --

    -The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.

  8. Re:Thanks Vice... by serviscope_minor · · Score: 4, Insightful

    There is a whole universe between "enjoying sex consensually" and "being the town whore". And yes, I do speak of experience as a polyamorous guy.

    Right in other words, there's some arbitrary threshold in your mind of "too much sex". Obviously you're on the right side of it despite claiming to be a polyamorous guy. But if some woman has just a bit too much sex, you bring out the insults, presumably because you can't bear the idea of (a) someone having more sex than you and (b) that person NOT having sex with you.

    Sucks to be you, bro!

    --
    SJW n. One who posts facts.