4. Female Trouble
“I learned early that I had to work harder than the white kids and harder than the boys.”
—QUEEN LATIFAH
The term “driving while black” refers to the fact that African-American drivers in the United States are much more likely than white people to get pulled over or otherwise singled out by authorities simply on the basis of suspicion or just for harassment. The expression’s been adapted to refer to similar forms of prejudice, like “flying while Muslim,” and I think there needs to be a related term: “online while female.” Women are more likely than men to be singled out online for stalking, harassment, invasions of privacy, and threats of physical violence.
When a woman gets hacked, she’s got a lot more to lose, and if Mat Honan were a woman, you can be almost certain that his experience of getting severely hacked would have been different. Not only would a girl go through everything Honan experienced, but on top of all that, she would also be subjected to gender targeting and all the ugly stuff that goes along with it.
Think about your intimate photos of yourself, ranging from swimsuit shots and selfies with cleavage to the photos and videos that are meant only for the eyes of a person you trust. Such photos, in the hands of someone who doesn’t care about you or your safety (or worse, someone who gets off on hurting women), are disastrous, no matter how proud you are of your body, how sex-positive you may be, or how comfortable you feel with being sexy and strong at the same time.
In this chapter, I’ll show you how to take charge of a situation in which your private content has been posted online maliciously or an attacker has otherwise attempted to compromise your reputation. This happens to people of all genders, but not as much as it happens to girls. Our gender makes us targets. Being “online while female” isn’t fair, but it’s a fact. Here’s how you can fight back.
RECOVERING FROM HARASSMENT
When someone takes your personal photos and posts them online, it’s not a joke. It’s harassment and a (very) personal attack. Yet some people will try to make you feel like this kind of attack is somehow your fault. Don’t ever—ever—listen to anyone who tells you that just because you’re a girl, you’re “asking for it” online (or offline). Some people will say that you shouldn’t take nude selfies at all if you don’t want them to be misused, as if taking a photo of yourself naked is some twisted way of asking to be punished for it. But we don’t deserve to lose our jobs, our friends, custody of our kids, our personal safety, our emotional well-being, or our mental health for doing what hundreds of celebrities do on Twitter every week (or what a million creepy dudes do on Twitter every day with their own dick pics).
Telling a victim, “you shouldn’t have done it” or “what did you expect?” is pointless, unfair, stupid, and just plain wrong. Instead of blaming and shaming, how about some information you can really use to help you make the decisions that are right for you? I’ll equip you with tools to mitigate, minimize, and possibly even avoid damage if something goes wrong.
Do this when you’re targeted:
• Stay calm online, don’t blame yourself, and take steps to strengthen your mental and emotional health in real life. Eat, sleep, and seek support from friends who care about you or even from a skilled therapist. (Find a list of therapists who “get” tech issues at http://smartprivacy.tumblr.com/therapists/.)
• Keep your social media accounts open, instead of quitting the Internet. They’ll be valuable tools later. It’s okay to change your account settings to private if you prefer. Some sites (such as Twitter) have simple on/off-style privacy settings, and others (like Facebook) have more-nuanced options for limiting access to your profile. And don’t be afraid to be heavy-handed with blocking profiles that bother you: block anyone, anytime, and you’ll feel much better for doing so.
• File a police report to put the harassment on the record, but don’t expect the police to do anything.
• Talk to a lawyer if you want to explore the possibility of pursuing legal action. Find a directory at http://withoutmyconsent.org/.
• Find all the websites, social media accounts, and forums containing your private images and videos.
• Make detailed records of everything you find: take screencaps; for each image, note the date and time of posting and the screen name of the person that posted it; download all the photos you find (they have hidden data on them); and save everything in a folder.
• Get the images taken down (see “Getting Your Private Photos Offline” on page 59).
• Consider paying a reputation service to help reduce the harm.
Online harassment increases your vulnerability to sexual violence, can cause real emotional harm, and can ruin your reputation. This harassment sends the message that women are inferior, sexual objects. It communicates to the world that it’s okay to devalue us and invites others to participate in harassing, humiliating, and hurting us.
There are so many real-life examples of all the types of harm I’ve described that going into detail would fill this book and so many more. (It would be the start of the most horrifying and depressing library in the world.) There are dozens of news stories about schoolteachers who’ve lost their jobs after their nude or swimsuit photos were posted online. Take, for example, the Christian schoolteacher who lost her job in 2013 after her nude selfies were stolen from her phone and linked with her name. In the same year, a female firefighter in Manchester (UK) lost her job for posing in lingerie for a shutterbug friend—even though her male firefighter coworkers had posed for racy firemen calendars.
The harm is real. In fact, the psychological and emotional damage of violating a girl’s privacy like this can kill her. In 2013, a 17-year-old girl in Brazil committed suicide after a video of her being sexual with two friends was posted online; she was depressed and angry for the month leading up to her suicide. That same year, a California girl killed herself after a video of her being raped while passed out was sent around at her high school. And countless girls have been blackmailed and threatened into having sex or paying money to avoid the online publication of private images and videos. That’s just what happened to Miss Teen USA in 2013 when her webcam was hacked.
But the negative emotions won’t last forever, and there are ways to cope.
When Will It Stop?
Having your privacy violated in ways that are specific to being a girl is extremely painful. It feels so personal, so awful, and so unfair—because it is. Online privacy violations can cause all the same reactions an in-person violation would.
Here are things you might feel:
• Anxiety and fear
• Detachment, as if you’re an outsider to your own life
• Intense distress
• Unsafe, even when it makes no sense to feel this way
• Irritability
• Anger
• Guilt, shame, and self-blame
• Mistrust and betrayal
• Depression and hopelessness
• Alienation and loneliness
• Embarrassment and exposure
And here are some things you might experience:
• Intrusive, upsetting thoughts or memories that can come on suddenly
• Unreliable memory, such as difficulty remembering exact details
• Nightmares and insomnia
• Physical reactions such as a pounding heart, rapid breathing, nausea, muscle tension, or sweating
• Avoidance of people, events, or situations
It’s okay to feel and experience all these things—they’re normal reactions. If you’re a victim of any kind of violation, make sure you show this list to the people who care about you so they know what you’re going through. Reading the list will give them an idea of what’s going on if you get depressed, snap at them out of the blue, or toss and turn in bed. It’ll also help people understand so they can give you the support and room you need to conquer this madness and, finally, heal.
These feelings are like storms; they come in and rage for a while, and they go back out to sea again. You may only feel some of the things mentioned here, or you may feel all of them. You may even feel confusing things sometimes, and many girls who’ve been violated (whether online or in real life) find they repeatedly cycle through these feelings.
These feelings are a lot like grief. Sometimes, just when you feel like you’re doing okay, one trigger will bring back that feeling in your chest or your stomach, and the emotional spiral begins again. You might feel like it will never end, but it will. The annoying part is that there won’t be one single moment when the way you feel inside just ends. But one day, you’ll realize that you haven’t felt upset in a long time, and that’s when you’ll know you’re through it.
Until then, here are some ways to deal with those feelings.
Staying Strong
Without My Consent (http://withoutmyconsent.org/), a resource for legal options regarding stalking, revenge porn, and online harassment, describes steps you can take on the road to emotional recovery:
Taking active, practical steps to address the problem can help. Consulting with an attorney or law enforcement officers is important if someone has threatened you. It’s also important to see what practical and legal steps you can take to combat the invasion of your privacy. Although a formal complaint process may increase your feelings of stress while it is ongoing, this kind of active coping with the situation helps some people feel better more quickly.
Addressing your feelings is important, too. Talking to people who care about you can help, as can talking to a counselor or therapist. Joining a support group may also comfort you and allow you to feel safer. Keeping a journal where you put your feelings into words also works for some people.
Doing things every day—especially small things—that make you feel good (for example, exercising, experiencing natural beauty, gardening) is important, as is finding a way to relax. Many people also find religious or spiritual practices help them cope with these kinds of painful experiences. Try not to rely on drugs, alcohol, or caffeine, as these substances can make things worse.
If the way you feel just won’t let up, and if it gets in the way of your important relationships, jeopardizes your job or schoolwork, or keeps you from functioning normally (especially if you feel like you just can’t take it any longer), reach out to someone who will help you weather your storms until they’re gone. Find someone to talk to who has experience working with trauma, harassment, or abuse. If you want some psychological support, these resources are great:
• Breakthrough.com: Confidential online counseling, therapy, and assessments
• American Psychological Association, Psychology Help Center: http://apa.org/helpcenter/
• eTherapi.com: Reputable, secure website and network where you can talk to a therapist online
• National Association of Social Workers: Tips on finding a therapist and resource links; http://helpstartshere.org/find-a-social-worker/
• American Counseling Association: Counselor and therapist locators; http://counseling.org/
• Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network: Sexual assault and sexual trauma help resources; http://rainn.org/get-help/ or 1.800.656.HOPE [4673]
• Tech Savvy Therapists: A growing resource of therapists who “get” issues surrounding technology and online problems; some will do online sessions; http://smartprivacy.tumblr.com/therapists/
What’s most important is that you find someone you feel safe enough with to talk about what’s happened and what you’re going through. As soon as you feel ready, though, it’s time to take back control of your personal content and online image from the ones who hurt you.
FIGHTING BACK
You should know a few facts about getting your private photos and videos removed from a website or taken out of the public eye. First, you can probably do it; second, there are most likely fewer of them out there than you think; and third, this whole awful experience will pass like a bad storm. Don’t let the situation get to you, and don’t give up. You’re going to win, so focus on staying strong. Keep records on everything you find and keep making content online, but manage your expectations: while there are more resources out there than ever before, you’ll find that some options are flat-out inadequate.
Navigating the Legal System
There are a few legal paths to justice, but no, you probably can’t successfully sue a website where someone else has posted photos of you. Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act protects websites from legal liability arising from most content uploaded by their users. Some women have tried to sue websites, and they’ve almost all lost (except for one case in which a Yahoo! representative said the company would take something down and then broke that promise).
The laws around the publication of intimate and private photos online without the subject’s consent are a mess. The rules themselves and the results you can obtain differ from country to country and from state to state in the United States, and even between civil and criminal federal laws. It’s easy to feel overwhelmed, but there are websites to help you understand what you can and can’t do, such as Without My Consent (http://withoutmyconsent.org/) and End Revenge Porn (http://endrevengeporn.org/). Make sure you talk to at least three lawyers before making a decision about how to move forward. Choose one who doesn’t make you feel bad, ashamed, or like any of this is your fault.
If you’re in the United States, ask your lawyer about the different angles you might consider pursuing, including intentional infliction of emotional distress, negligence, stalking, breach of contract, and invasion of privacy claims.
And keep this in mind: many women end up not being able to use the legal system. It’s extremely expensive, it draws more attention to you, it’s incredibly brutal for your emotional state, and it will reveal your identity even further. Often, the legal system can’t even do that much to help you. (The deck is also stacked against you in court if your attacker is broke; you won’t be able to get damages from someone who has no money.)
But you can accomplish some things through the legal system. In addition to awarding monetary damages, courts can provide injunctive relief (court orders) that can require your attacker to stop doing something. Depending on the laws you’re dealing with, you might be able to get a court order that requires the attacker to stop posting images or videos or to take down images that have already been posted.
Getting a Restraining Order
If you think you might be in physical danger from the attacker posting your private images or information, get a restraining order. Even if you don’t think it will work, you need one on record if you’re seriously afraid for your safety.
You can get a civil restraining order on your own, though a lawyer will make the process easier. Even if the court doesn’t grant your request, it will document that you’re having serious problems with someone harassing you. If you need to build a bigger case later, that paper trail will be critical. Because court proceedings are public records, your filing will also put a dent in your attacker’s reputation.
Here’s my story. I was cyberstalked, threatened, abused, and harassed online by two creeps (a man and a woman who met each other while attacking me) for over a year. They did this on every website where I had a public social media account, on websites that mentioned me, on news websites that published my work, and anywhere friends posted photos with me. They even created blogs to harass me and post private information about me online. For better or for worse, they used people-finder websites to source their personal information about me, and most of it was incorrect.
Though they lived in different states, they conspired (unsuccessfully) to get my social media accounts taken away and to post as much personal information about me as possible in blog post comments and photo comments. They even edited fake information into the Wikipedia page about me. They emailed threats directly to me, and they bragged online about stalking me. One of the stalkers told an email list that I was no longer on the list thanks to their stalking and harassment and that someone should take away my car. Shortly afterward my car was vandalized—twice.
When I filed for a restraining order against both of them, they published the restraining order filing to the Wikipedia page about me—with my address on it. It was 2007: the judge who oversaw the case said he didn’t understand how a restraining order could apply to the Internet, and he didn’t grant the order against my abusers on this technical point. I was among the first women to seek a legal path to justice for online harassment (a major reason why I’m on the advisory board for Without My Consent.) At least the judge didn’t deny the need for both restraining orders, so he didn’t dismiss them, and he ordered the filings kept open so I could reapply later.
Thankfully, times have changed, and judges now understand the harm and damage that online abusers can do. But even though I had a judge who didn’t get it, the restraining order filing entered my abusers’ names on police records. It also provided me with police reports that documented their stalking, harassment, and abuse. Those police files came in handy when I needed to protect myself from them again later and when I requested removal of my personal, private information from people-finder websites.
In California, if the person threatening you is your current or former lover, you can ask for a domestic violence restraining order. This order may prohibit the online attacker from coming within a certain distance of you, your home, and your workplace. Depending on exactly what the order says, the police might be able to arrest the online attacker if they violate the order offline.
Even once you take action against your harasser, however, there’s still work to be done: it’s time to get your personal content out of the public eye and polish your reputation back to its original shine.
GETTING YOUR PRIVATE PHOTOS OFFLINE
Having something removed doesn’t mean it’s actually gone. Many sites and apps keep things on their servers, and as of this writing, there’s nothing anyone can do about it. But you can still get photos and videos out of the public eye. They’ll fade quickly from memory, especially from the memory of search engines.
Getting content off sites and out of search results is like playing a game of Whac-A-Mole. One thing pops up, you deal with it, and then another thing pops up, and you have to deal with that. The process is annoying and exhausting. But you’ll notice that it comes in waves, and each wave is smaller until, eventually, the whole thing fades away.
Believe it or not, you can make it fade away faster by increasing your online presence—making yourself more visible. In fact, a primary step in dealing with revenge porn or any other kinds of unwanted online content about you is not to delete your social media accounts. Don’t disappear from the Internet! Instead, make as much noise as possible to drown out the search results you want to eliminate.
If you remove your social media accounts, your blog or blog posts, or your normal online presence, you’ll allow the bad content to gradually replace any good search results you had going in the first place. It’s okay to change your account settings to private for a while or close comments on posts and photos to reduce the stress—but stand your ground. Showing the online world who you really are—with dignity—is part of how you’ll fight fire with fire.
Doing It Yourself
It’s going to feel horrible, but you’ll probably need to go find the images or videos and get them taken down yourself. The police won’t do it, and you can do the most damage control if you’re the only one who knows what was put online, and where it is. You’ll need to find all images and videos and send each website and its host a takedown request that asks sites to remove your content.
Before you start, reach out to someone for support like your sister, a very close friend, or—even better—a team. Think about who makes you feel protected, who in your life has reminded you that you’re powerful, who makes you feel like who you really are, and who you’d pick to put on your own team of superheroes. Have someone who loves and supports you walk through the steps with you, because it’s hard to stay organized when it feels like the Internet is your enemy. Have them present with you as you document and request content removal. Sure, you could do it alone, but it will help to have someone holding your hand—someone who knows and believes in you.
With your support system in place, start tracking down content for removal. Here are some tips:
• Make an evidence folder.
• List the locations of the private online content that you know about, including each website address and the “report abuse” or Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) information for the website. (You might find this information in the website’s terms of service, its privacy policy, or a separate DMCA policy.)
• Take screenshots and download copies of the photos from each website; you’re collecting evidence.
• Find more content using Google and its reverse image search. Use reverse image search to look for the photos you know are being used against you. In addition, image search your icon/avatar photos to see if they’re being used without your consent anywhere else. To find this function, look in Google’s search bar for the little gray camera icon, click it, and then follow the instructions.
• Do a regular Google search for image filenames, your phone number, the name and aliases of your harasser, and any other words or usernames associated with the images and posts.
• Take screenshots and download copies of the photos from the website.
• Create a Google alert for your name, your email address, and any unique names associated with the images or videos being posted about you (see “Eight Privacy Tips to Use Right Now” on page 4).
Make a document with all of the information you have about the person who’s attacking you and posting your private images and information online. Now you can file your police report. But don’t delete anything; you’re still going to need it.
Next, start getting things taken down. Begin with a general removal request, even if you don’t own the copyright to the image. Each website hosting the content will have its own form or contact procedure; again, look for the website’s DMCA section. If you do own the copyright to the content and the website doesn’t respond or won’t take your images and videos down, you can submit an online copyright infringement claim form for each search engine (find forms at http://copyright.gov/onlinesp/agenta.pdf). Each search engine must give the person who posted the images a few days to file a counterclaim. But to file a counterclaim, they have to reveal their real identity.
You can also escalate to a DMCA takedown, under the right circumstances. First, use a site like http://whoishostingthis.com/ to learn who the website’s host is. Contact each website’s administrator and ask them to remove the videos or images. If you created the images or you own the rights to them, then you own the copyright, and you should ask for removal with a DMCA request. A DMCA request can be used when the images and videos are your original property, and an estimated 80 percent of private photos and videos that girls want removed is content they own. (Just be sure to only issue a takedown request if you own the copyright to the content. If you misrepresent that you own the rights to an image or if anything else you say in your DMCA is incorrect, you can get in a lot of legal trouble—including a possible lawsuit under the DMCA.)
If you have a lawyer, run your DMCA takedown request by them. Some women use services like DMCA Defender, but make sure you read reviews or talk to others who have used these services before you trust them with your very private problem. You can find DMCA letter templates online, and there is one on page 147 of the Resources section.
Most websites with any adult content will have a DMCA-specific email address or a link for DMCA takedown requests in the Contact Us area of the website. When the website doesn’t have one, send your takedown request via email to abuse@<website>.com, DMCA@<website>.com, and admin@<website>.com, and send a physical copy to any address you can find for the website. One of those email addresses or the snail mail address should reach a real person.
If You’re a Minor
If you’re a minor in your country (under the legal age of consent, which is 18 in the United States), you’ll have an easier time getting naked or sexual photos and videos removed. When you follow the steps in this chapter for getting things taken down, make sure to tell them you’re a minor. But if you’re even a day older than the age of consent, don’t claim to be a minor; if you’re caught lying, the website owner might get angry with you and make things worse. And if you’re pursuing legal action, misrepresenting yourself could count against you in other ways. (Ask your lawyer if anything like this comes up, because they can tell you what the laws are for the location you’re taking legal action in.)
When you’re a minor, a lot of social media sites will really rush to get your content offline. In some locations, you may have the law on your side for nonnude and nonsexual posts and photos, as long as they contain something that belongs to you. A 2015 law in California even states that websites and apps have to let people under 18 take their stuff down.
Outsourcing the Work
Another option is a reputation service. Reputation services find and address negative mentions of you online by deleting them or bumping them to somewhere they’ll be less visible. The biggest business doing reputation cleanup is Reputation.com (formerly Reputation Defender). Again, be sure to read reviews of the service you’re considering to see what its customers have to say before you sign up and hand over your money.
If you use a reputation service, make sure it’s actually reputable. If the service is attached to, related to, or recommended by one of the sites where you’ve found private photos you didn’t give someone permission to post, don’t use it! It’s probably a scam.
The cost of help from a reputation service varies a lot. It can be expensive if you have a stalker—or more than one stalker—who has been bothering you for a long time. For example, one man paid Reputation.com more than $10,000 to scrub hateful posts from his online footprint. (His girlfriend was the victim of online harassment, and when they started dating, her attacker started targeting him as well.) Yearly basic services for individuals start at around $5,000, and the company will make a plan to fit your situation. Remember that its goal is getting your money, though it does have systems, knowledge, access, and resources unavailable to you otherwise.
You’ll notice that sites like Reputation.com do things that you can also do yourself, such as create positive content about you to push negative results off of top search pages. (This is another reason not to delete your social profiles, and why you should be creating positive content about yourself, too.) But even huge companies like Reputation.com can only do so much, so don’t expect any promises of “gone forever” to come true, because it’s usually not 100 percent possible.
Still, for the guy who paid 10 grand to get rid of his girlfriend’s stalker, Reputation.com managed to push the torrent of hate to page 27 of a Google search, and most search users don’t go past the first page.
Also consider outsourcing tasks to freelancers around the world; they can do things you dread, often cheaply. For instance, you might use sites like Amazon’s Mechanical Turk (http://www.mturk.com/), YourManInIndia.com, Remote Staff (http://remotestaff.com.au/), Elance.com, and so on to hire someone to check websites to make sure that content is removed. Just make sure to stipulate confidentiality and anonymity. Also, warn whomever you hire that there may be offensive content involved so they’re not surprised.
Whether you use a reputation service, clean up the mess yourself, or hire freelancers, I suggest you still use the services of privacy companies such as Abine (http://www.abine.com/), which remove your private information from people-search websites. These services have already done the legwork, and they know their way around privacy-violating websites of all stripes and what websites are required to do under the law. Also, sites like Abine will go after privacy-violating websites until they comply.
Hiring a privacy company will probably also boost your mental health: it feels good knowing someone else is taking care of it, and you won’t get bogged down or overwhelmed by frustration with the workload, or have to see all of that offensive stuff over and over again.
PREVENTATIVE MAINTENANCE
When managing your reputation online, create a system to manage all of the information you gather so you don’t lose track of any important details. This will also leave you with an organized and complete file to hand over to your lawyer, law enforcement, a court, or any other authorities along the way.
A spreadsheet is a good tool for tracking the information. For example, if your attacker contacts you on the phone or harasses you on social media, add an item for that and a column for the date and time of harassment, in addition to screencapping and writing down everything. Sometimes your attacker’s username or screen name will be a pseudonym (a fake name). Collect all of it, and you’ll be able to spot patterns.
Here are some columns to add to your spreadsheet:
• Actions (anything your attacker has done, such as “posted photo,” “posted video,” “left comment,” “made blog post,” or “contacted me”)
• The date the action happened
• The date you found out what the attacker had done
• Where the action took place (or the URL where it can be found)
• Any screen names or usernames associated with the posting, even if you know the attacker is using a pseudonym
• The name of the folder where you put copies and screencaps of the evidence
• Contact information for the website where the action took place, including its DMCA email address
• The date you sent a DMCA takedown notice
• The date the website responded and what the response was
Each situation is unique, and you might need to add columns for other information. For instance, if the website doesn’t take your photo down and you decide to send a takedown notice to the website host, add the host’s contact information, date of contact, and response.
Unfortunately, getting harassed, attacked, smeared, or worse online isn’t the only damage an online privacy violation can do. What happens if someone uses your personal information to steal your identity? Read on, and I’ll explain how to combat such a situation—and prevent it from happening in the first place.