47% of Spaniards know a victim of revenge pornography

Jul 29. (Portaltic/EP) –

Taking an intimate image and sharing it with other people has a dark side known as revenge pornography, the incidence of which is increasing to the point that 47 percent of Spaniards know a victim of this type of abuse.

Kaspersky Global Study ‘The naked truth’‘How Sharing Intimate Images Has Reshaped Our World’ reveals a significant shift in attitudes and unwritten norms of social and romantic interactions in the digital age.

According to the cybersecurity company, this is one of the largest studies carried out to date in this field, and it shows the normalisation of the practice of taking intimate photos and sharing them, facilitated by mobile phones.

Around a quarter (22%) of Spaniards have explicit images of themselves stored on their devices. This figure varies by age: the 16-24 and 25-34 age groups have the most intimate images of themselves (42%), a figure that falls to 7 percent for adults aged 55 and over.

25 percent of respondents have shared images of themselves with people they are dating or chatting with and 16 percent have sent them to someone they have never met in real life. By age, the highest percentage (45%) is found among people aged 16 to 25.

Having intimate images of yourself and sharing them with other people is not bad in itself, but it opens the door to abuse of these images, and this is when we talk about revenge pornography, a term coined in 2007 that refers to the act of sharing sexually explicit images or videos of a person without their consent.

In Spain, complaints of this type of abuse have almost tripled in the last five years. From 1,691 in 2018 to 4,460 in 2023, according to data from the Ministry of the Interior collected by Kaspersky.

According to the study, almost half (47%) of respondents in Spain know someone who has experienced this type of online abuse and 7% have experienced it personally. This crime significantly affects younger generations: 77% of respondents between 16 and 24 years old and 68% between 25 and 34 years old say they have suffered this type of experience.

As for the use of such material, 15 percent of Spaniards admit to having shared intimate images of other people, compared to 33 percent who have received such material, which for the cybersecurity company indicates that some people may be serial senders. Not only that, but 24 percent believe that receiving an intimate image gives them rights over its content.

Kaspersky says that setting clear boundaries within relationships before sharing such images is essential, but only 25 percent of respondents do so. And only 22 percent of Spaniards who shared a compromising image requested its removal from another person’s device.

The study also raises the question of so-called ‘victim blaming’, as almost half (47%) of respondents believe that if you have shared an image of yourself, it is still your responsibility if it ends up in the wrong hands.

“The findings of our research underline the growing normalisation of a critical social problem: the rise in the sharing of intimate images, especially among young people, without considering the long-term consequences,” explains Kaspersky Lead Security Researcher Marc Rivero in a press release sent to Europa Press.

Artificial intelligence is also transforming privacy in the context of intimate images, raising serious questions about consent and control over our own image.

42 percent of people surveyed by Kaspersky agree that people can now create fake intimate images using this technology, raising questions about whether personal consent to share such material is still important.