As she scrolled through the website which had illegally shared her most private intimate pictures, Jane* felt sheer panic.
Male users of the image-sharing forum had discovered her name and home town, even sharing her social media accounts and LinkedIn profile. She was totally identifiable.
“Men were bigging each other up in these chat forums and trading images like Pokemon cards,” she said.
Jane and more than 20 other women from her community had become the victims of intimate image abuse, which saw explicit pictures and videos of them shared on an online image board without their consent.
Their pictures are believed to have been stolen when their Facebook and Snapchat accounts were targeted in a hack in 2022, before they surfaced without warning in 2023.
The fringe site, which was searchable on Google, fostered a “collector culture” among anonymous users, who posted and traded sexual and explicit images of women without their permission.
“You just lose a complete sense of control of your life in every aspect,” Jane, whose name we have changed to protect her identity, told The Independent.
“You don’t know when this abuse can crop up again. Your professional life is in jeopardy. It’s like whack a mole, the threat of it is constant.”
The group is not alone. These women are among thousands of victims targeted with this kind of abuse every year – and numbers are increasing.
The Revenge Porn Helpline, a Home Office-backed initiative dedicated to supporting victims of non-consensual image abuse, has just recorded the busiest year since in its decade-long history. Almost 25,000 images were reported to the helpline in 2025, which is an increase of 11 per cent year on year.
Women were overwhelmingly the targets, with 98.9 per cent of reported images depicting female victims. In more than eight in ten cases, they were shared by men – most commonly a current or former partner.
Where men are targeted, intimate images were used for sextortion – where a victim is threatened for money – in more than half of cases. In eight in ten cases, this was carried out by criminal gangs.
The helpline, which is run by six dedicated women, has managed to get 450,000 images removed since it was founded in 2015.
Despite the sharing of intimate images without consent being criminalised a decade ago, just 4 per cent of victims reported the incident to the police and most said they had a negative experience when they came forward, according to the helpline’s annual report.
Among 244 victims who reported their abuse, they complained about police inaction, unsympathetic treatment or officers using victim-blaming language.
When Jane contacted police, she said officers gave her a leaflet on internet safety and closed the case within a few days. After Jane refused to give up, the investigation was reopened and remains ongoing.
She said victims experience a “postcode lottery” in terms of police response, adding: “I think they’re just completely ill-equipped to deal with this kind of harm. They don’t understand the harm, they don’t understand the internet, they don’t understand this form of abuse or the impact on victims and survivors.”
The National Police Chiefs’ Council has been working with the Revenge Porn Helpline to improve their response and encourage more victims to come forward.
Detective chief superintendent Claire Hammond, from the National Centre for Violence Against Women and Girls and Public Protection, said victims deserve to be “supported and protected from the moment they come forward”, adding that they are working with the helpline to improve responses, including emotional and practical support for victims and the takedown of images.
“Technology-facilitated abuse is evolving at a fast rate, and we are working hard to produce new training and guidance for officers responding to these crimes, so that cases are handled sensitively, evidence is gathered effectively and perpetrators are brought to justice using the full powers of the law,” she added.
“We would encourage anyone who is a victim of intimate image abuse to report it to the police, we are here to help you.”
Last year, Jane threatened the regulator Ofcom with a judicial review if it did not take enforcement action against the website where their images were published. Since their images were posted, Jane and some of the other women have been approached on social media by male users of the forum.
Supported by a legal team at Leigh Day and Mishcon de Raya, Jane urged the regulator to use their new powers under the Online Safety Act to investigate the site and help them regain control over their images.
Ofcom confirmed it opened a formal investigation into the platform in March this year, including whether it is failing to comply with its duties around illegal content.
Data from the Revenge Porn Helpline shows images are shared over a wide variety of platforms, including pornography websites and mainstream social media platforms, including Facebook, Instagram and X.
Fortunately, in most cases, such sites comply with take down requests from the helpline. But niche forums, like the one which targeted Jane, are harder to target.
The impact on victims is severe, with reports of worsening mental health conditions doubling year-on-year, according to the helpline. The fallout can also impact employment, with some victims reporting job loss or a relationship break down after their images were leaked.
Shockingly, in a growing number of cases, subjects were also victims of voyeurism after they were filmed or photographed without their knowledge or consent.
Deep-fake or synthetic sexual images have also increased year on year, with 63 reported to the helpline in 2025. Although numbers remain low, experts believe this is highly under-reported because most victims do not know their pictures have been doctored, often using AI “nudification” apps.
Sophie Mortimer, head of support services at SWGfL which operates the helpline as part of the UK Safer Internet Centre, said the response to this abuse is “still too slow, too fragmented, and too difficult for those affected”.
“We need a coordinated response, from platforms, policymakers and law enforcement, to truly tackle this harm,” she added.
Janaya Walker, interim director of the End Violence Against Women Coalition, which supported Jane, said the latest figures show a “disturbing rise” in non-consensual intimate image abuse.
“We have been urging government and the regulator to do more to prevent this form of abuse which serves to harm, distress, humiliate and control women and girls – and is often carried out by a partner or ex-partner,” she added.
“The data also shows that the overwhelming majority did not report to the police, with survivors often desperately failed when they do.”
She called for “stronger and swifter action” against platforms which enable this abuse, noting that they had supported Jane in her efforts to secure meaningful enforcement in her case.
“But the burden should not rest on survivors like Jane,” she added. “All women and girls deserve to live free from all forms of violence, and the scale of intimate image abuse in this report shows how much further we have to go.”
An Ofcom spokesperson said tackling online harms facing women and girls online is one of their highest priorities.
“Platforms must have systems in place to tackle harmful content and take it down when they become aware of it, including non-consensual intimate image abuse,” they added.
“We’ve shown we’ll take action where companies fall short. Since the Online Safety Act came into force last year, we’ve launched investigations into more than 100 sites – including the service at the centre of Jane’s case.”
*Names in this article have been changed to protect the victim’s right to anonymity
