Victims of 'revenge porn' fight back
Full story: revenge porn
If you did an Internet search for Emma's name three years ago you could easily find a picture of her at age 17, naked.
It was posted online without her consent and while she could never make it go away, what she did do has made her feel more empowered and in control.
It is a reality also faced by hundreds of women and teenagers in Australia whose photos have been stolen and published, and it is extremely damaging.
The trend known as 'revenge porn' refers to photos being distributed by someone they were sent to without permission and it led to an even more frightening development.
'Non-consensual pornography' has the same effect as revenge porn but is done through hacking and acquiring material that might never have otherwise been seen by anyone but its owner.
In October 2011, Emma Holten woke to find her email had been hacked and her private photos stolen.
READ MORE: Jail terms proposed for revenge porn offenders
'He just feels sorry for himself because he's in jail"
"My inbox just filled with messages from strangers that contained links or attachments that were these photos of myself as a 17 year old. I was just so shocked and so taken aback that this could happen to me."
It didn’t stop there, the hacker also stole and published her address, phone number, family names, Facebook friends list, her school and places she had worked, even her gym.
"What comes up when you Google 'Emma Holten' was not my choice anymore, it had been taken away from me. So I felt like a tainted person."
"I was very aware that I wanted to focus on consent and I wanted to focus on choice."
Emma undertook an audacious social experiment, taking new photographs that were naked, but non-sexual and releasing them publicly, completely under her control.
She changed the way the world could see her on the internet, at least in part.
"We wanted it to be the way a woman might see herself in everyday life —brushing her teeth, reading a book, getting dressed in the morning. Just contexts that signal, you know what, I'm naked in situations where it doesn't have anything to do with sex, where it's just me there," she said.
"Because I don't mind people seeing my breasts. But I want to make the choice."
Emma says sharing nude photographs is an intimate act that should not be treated as taboo and the focus should be on the people who make them public.
She says she was never pressured to take a photo of herself and enjoyed doing it with her partner.
"I don't remember the discussion, I don't remember it being an issue. I just remember you know, it as a natural extension of being intimate."
"We were in a long relationship almost three years together and I think he was my first serious boyfriend."
'Revenge Porn' and the law
In America, more than half the States have now made it illegal to post intimate images online without consent.
In Australia, only one state, Victoria, has such a law.
This year Kevin Bollaert became the first person in the US to be convicted for running a revenge porn website — of which there are hundreds.
He was convicted on 27 counts of identity theft and extortion and sentenced to 18 years jail, but his victims have been given a life sentence.
‘You Got Posted’ was a website dedicated to humiliating women by publishing intimate images that had been leaked by hackers and jilted lovers.
He also published women's names, locations, even links to social media accounts.
Further adding to his scheme, he then created a second site offering a service to have the photos removed for a fee.
He caused humiliation with one site, and profited from it with the other.
Reporter PJ Madam was allowed to interview him at George F Bailey maximum-security detention centre in San Diego.
"I don't know why it was so appealing but obviously it is because my website was very popular. People just like to see each other naked I guess."
"I'm not sure why people think their lives are ruined I mean. Everybody has a naked body, everybody is naked at some point."
But Bollaert is not without remorse, and says he wished he had shut the site down.
"I guess a couple of times I did realise … I should probably quit doing this.
"A few times I was thinking about shutting the website down."
"It was a stupid idea, a really bad idea I wish I never did it and yeah I guess I took freedom to the extreme."
But victims, like Emma Holten, believe the punishment fits the crime.
"[Kevin] still publicly ridicules his victims, even published some of the letters asking, pleading to have things removed," she said.
If you are a victim of Non-consentual Pornography contact the CCRI Crisis Helpline: 844-878-CCRI (2274) or http://www.cybercivilrights.org/
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