FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE | January 30, 2019
Delaware State Senate Majority Caucus
Contact: Scott Goss (302) 744-4180, or
Dylan McDowell (302) 744-4282
DOVER – The Delaware Senate this week advanced a bill to crack down on the unauthorized disclosure of intimate images, a practice commonly referred to as “revenge porn.”
Introduced in June, Senate Bill 169 is part of a nationwide effort to implement a uniform set of rules and civil remedies for victims of revenge porn. The bill would explicitly define what level of privacy people can expect when it comes to intimate photos and videos, who qualifies as a victim, who can bring civil litigation, and what kinds of legal remedies victims can pursue.
SB 169 passed the Senate unanimously on Wednesday, with all Senators asking to be added as cosponsors.
“Privacy risks abound in today’s internet age, but there is something especially damaging and traumatic about having private or explicit images leaked to the public,” said Sen. Stephanie Hansen, D-Middletown. “The distribution of those images without the consent of victims – often women – leaves the subject of those images feeling violated and helpless. This bill can change that and would add Delaware to the growing list of states that have adopted strong prohibitions against this practice.”
States have scrambled to craft policy around revenge porn as the advance of smart phones and internet usage has given rise to sexting and other ways of sharing intimate images online. In 2018, the Uniform Law Commission proposed the Civil Remedies for Unauthorized Disclosure of Intimate Images Act, legislation already enacted in Nebraska, Colorado, and Illinois. SB 169 would bring this law to Delaware.
A 2014 study from the Pew Research Center showed that roughly 1-in-10 adults had sent a sext of themselves to someone else and 1-in-5 had received one. Both figures had more than doubled from 2012. Additionally, 3% of cell phone owners had forwarded a sext to a third party, foreshadowing the rise of revenge porn and related forms of abuse.
In 2016, the Center for Innovative Public Health Research published a study claiming that one-in-25 Americans has been a victim of revenge porn.
SB 169, also known as the “Delaware Uniform Civil Remedies for Unauthorized Disclosure of Intimate Images Act,” provides that any individual who “suffers harm from a person’s intentional disclosure or threatened disclosure of an intimate image” has standing to sue if they did not consent to the disclosure, the image was private, and the depicted individual was identifiable. Importantly, victims may still be able to seek restitution even if they had initially consented to the creation or dissemination of the image but the image was later distributed without their consent.
Like many existing privacy laws, the bill applies only to sensitive content created or obtained under circumstances in which the individual had a reasonable expectation of privacy.
The act of producing or disseminating revenge porn was broadly criminalized in 2014, but did not establish civil remedies that would allow victims to sue for damages.
The bill now heads to the House for a final vote.
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