Tackling Image-based Abuse

Debate between Kirith Entwistle and Rachel Taylor

Tuesday 12th November 2024 Westminster Hall

[Rachel Taylor]

My apologies, Mr Vickers.

[Kirith Entwistle]

My hon. Friend raises an important point. We should absolutely be putting victims at the heart of any legislation on this topic.

I do not believe that in their 14 years the previous Government did anywhere near enough to tackle the issue. I can already see the Labour Government taking decisive steps to change the answer to the question of whether we are doing enough. I welcome the Government’s manifesto commitment to ban the creation of sexually explicit deepfakes, an essential step in safeguarding women and girls from malicious technology. I am encouraged by the collaborative work under way among the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, the Home Office and the Ministry of Justice to identify a legislative vehicle to ensure that those who create these images without consent are held accountable. I am also pleased that new changes to the Online Safety Act will make image-based abuse a priority offence.

Although those are positive steps, they represent only modest progress. As experts such as End Violence Against Women and the #NotYourPorn campaign have pointed out, sharing intimate images without consent was already prioritised under the Online Safety Act. So far, the changes under this Government have been merely administrative and merely incremental. Having listened to survivors of image-based abuse, I urge the Minister to agree that this is no time for incremental change.

Georgia Harrison is a courageous campaigner who shared her story with the Women and Equalities Committee. Georgia’s images were distributed without her consent, leading to years of harassment, scrutiny and anguish. Even after her abuser was convicted, Georgia continued to see her images circulate online—a haunting reminder that, as she has stated, her life will never be the same again.

Another survivor is “Jodie”, who bravely spoke to the BBC about the trauma of being deepfaked by someone she once considered her best friend. Jodie discovered that images from her private Instagram account had been overlaid on pornographic material and posted across Reddit and other forums, with users invited to rate her body. Jodie endured this abuse for five years. She recalls:

“I felt alone. The emotional toll was enormous. There were points I was crying so much I burst the blood vessels in my eyes. I couldn’t sleep and when I did, I had nightmares.”

In Jodie’s case, the perpetrator was asking others to create explicit images of her, revealing a shameful grey area in our current legislation. That is why Jodie, along with campaign partners the End Violence Against Women coalition, Glamour and #NotYourPorn, is calling for an image-based abuse law.

Speaking as a mother, I cannot imagine having my child endure such horror. I am grateful that Baroness Owen of Alderley Edge has introduced a private Member’s Bill in the other place to address this gap. She has done a great deal of work on the issue, keeping victims like Georgia and Jodie at the heart of her Bill.

Georgia and Jodie’s experiences underscore three critical flaws in the Online Safety Act. The first is the glaring failure to criminalise abusive images themselves. Georgia’s story illustrates this brutal oversight: despite her abuser’s conviction, the absence of a stay-down provision allows her images still to circulate online, forcing her to relive the trauma with each resurfacing. To quote Professor Clare McGlynn,

“every day these images remain online is another day of extreme suffering for victims.”

Survivors deserve certainty that once their abuse is addressed, it is addressed permanently.

A second flaw in the Act is its reliance on Ofcom, whose current enforcement powers lack the agility and speed needed for an online world in which, if one website is blocked, another can appear instantly. Initiatives such as the StopNCII.org campaign have revealed how social media platforms consistently outmanoeuvre Ofcom. This is effectively leaving tech giants to determine whether supporting survivors like Georgia serves their profit-driven interests. To close the enforcement gaps, I stand with the End Violence Against Women coalition, Glitch and others in calling for a national online abuse commission —a dedicated body to champion the rights of victims and survivors of online abuse.

Finally, our legislation fails survivors by denying them accessible civil remedies—such as immediate take-downs and compensation for emotional harm—outside the criminal process. For survivors such as Jodie who have endured years of abuse, the inability to seek swift relief without a lengthy, retraumatising trial is a devastating gap. Creating a statutory civil offence for image-based abuse would not only empower survivors to seek redress directly against perpetrators and platforms, but give them that all-important second chance. The Minister will know that organisations such as South West Grid for Learning and the UK Safer Internet Centre consider civil remedies as much-needed lifelines for survivors. I wholeheartedly agree.

Today, through Georgia and Jodie’s stories, we have seen the devastating cost of our inaction on the escalating, ever-evolving crisis of image-based abuse. For too long, our legislation has had three glaring deficiencies: the absence of a stay-down provision, the lack of an online abuse commission and the unavailability of civil remedies.

Returning to my earlier questions, I want to be able to tell survivors that this Government are doing everything possible to support them. I want to reassure them that our Ministers are responding in real time to the scale and urgency of the crisis. With every day we delay, more women and girls are thrust into cycles of harm without the protections that they urgently need and deserve. I look forward to hearing from the Minister exactly how we will deliver this assurance. I would also be grateful if I could discuss the matter further with the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology at the earliest opportunity.

Let us not wait another day to act. Survivors need real action, not just incremental change. We owe it to Georgia, Jodie and all those who have suffered.