Ever thought of screengrabbing someone’s Snapchat and sharing it? Well, be careful because if you do, you could face two years in prison.
So Snapchat is home to a lot of naughty pictures (apparently). We’ve not spent too much time there, obvs, but reliable sources tell us this is the truth. Well, you could face up to two years in prison if you share “private” pictures of someone without their permission under British copyright law.
That news might come as a bit of welcome relief for certain male celebrities who have had their private stash of naughty pictures released to the world recently.
In March this year the then culture minister Ed Vaizey was asked whether steps “to prevent Snapchat images being made public without the consent of the image owner”, would be presented, by MP Jim Shannon.
Vaizey replied,
“Under UK copyright law, it would be unlawful for a Snapchat user to copy an image and make it available to the public without the consent of the image owner.
“The image owner would be able to sue anyone who does this for copyright infringement.”
© belchonock Depositphotos
Sharing private or sexual images without permission could get you into prison type of trouble.
We spoke with lawyer, Phil Gorski at Blacks Solicitors who told us,
“Last year there was a new piece of legislation introduced, which actually set out the specific crime of revenge porn. There is a specific charge that can be brought and so the option is there and should probably be taken if the information has been distributed to a large number of people.
“What the legislation says is that where you’ve got photographs and the phrasing is, “… of a private or sexual nature …” That doesn’t mean you have to be showing intimate body parts or anything like that. It can be in a sort of context that’s perceived to be sexual.
“If they are disclosed and it’s done without consent and the purpose of disclosing them was to cause distress or embarrassment, which when you think about it, it would be very difficult to not be the case. Then, there’s a potential crime that’s taken place.”
Of course, if you’re worried about your pink bits being on display to the entire world it might be best never to put them on the web in the first place. Remember nothing you share on the internet is secure.
Gorski continued,
“Where these images are taken consensually then you need to be thinking very carefully about whether you actually want to do it or not. Not putting yourself in the position where there are images around in the first place is the easy fix but not necessarily something that someone will always want to do.”
