For Jess, it starts with a selfie: a selfie taken in her bedroom, without any intention, at that point, to show it to anyone. But then she does: she sends it to her boyfriend. He says that it is just for him; he won’t show anyone else. Why would he? He wouldn’t want anyone else looking at his girlfriend.

But then, a few months later, Jess isn’t his girlfriend anymore.

It isn’t until Jess is woken one morning by her phone buzzing with notifications that she realises her ex has uploaded the nude selfies she has shared, along with videos they’d made together, to a free porn website. The material has been found and circulated among her peers at college. She feels sick, angry, betrayed.

But Jess is 17. She has heard that taking and sharing the pictures counts as creating and distributing child pornography - she fears she will incriminate herself if she contacts the police to report it, and she knows her parents will be furious with her, so instead she does nothing. Weeks go by and Jess gives up her friends, gives up her college course and gives up hoping this will ever be behind her.

Unfortunately, Jess’ story isn’t unique. So-called “revenge porn” - in which sexually explicit images or videos of a person are posted online without their consent and to cause embarrassment or distress, typically by a former partner - is all too common. A freedom of information (FOI) request by The Student Room revealed that, between January and December 2019, 360 teenagers were suspected of “disclosing private sexual photographs with intent to cause distress”. The FOI also revealed that there were 541 victims of revenge porn under the age of 18 reported to 36 police forces in England and Wales in that year. And, as many cases will go unreported, it is likely that there will be students in every college who have experienced this.

Unsurprisingly, these crimes can have a serious impact on the education and wellbeing of the young people involved and, for that reason, colleges need to be aware of the problem. So, what do lecturers and college leaders need to know about revenge porn? And what can be done to reduce the risks of students falling victim to these crimes?

Kate Isaacs, founder of the #NotYourPorn campaign, says that one of the first things that educators need to understand is how normalised it has become to share this type of material, particularly online. Many free pornography websites have dedicated tags to help users find what are supposedly “stolen” videos - some of which specifically feature “teenagers”, says Isaacs.

“Teenagers see categories of porn videos described as ‘leaked sex tapes’ and ‘stolen Snapchat teens’ and, as a result, stealing videos and sharing them has been normalised,” she explains.

“So, we have this awful cycle happening, where teens who share images consensually then have them shared on without their consent because the person they’ve shared it with feels entitled to upload it.”

In some cases, the victim may not even have been involved in creating the content in the first place. Advances in “deepfake” technology mean that it is now possible to quickly create nude images of another person from a clothed photo of them (see box, below).

Theoretically, any young person who knows how to access this technology could create nude images of another young person and upload them, not only without their consent but also without ever being in a sexual relationship with them.

During the pandemic, it is clear that revenge porn has been on the rise. Calls to a helpline for victims of revenge porn, run by the UK Safer Internet Centre, rose by 22 per cent year on year over the first lockdown period.

What, then, can further education providers do to help their students protect themselves?

It seems that one obvious way to reduce the risk would be to dissuade young people from taking sexually explicit images in the first place. Unfortunately, according to Isaacs, trying to stop students doing this could be a lost cause.

“We have to come to the conclusion now that teenagers are going to take these images,” she says. “No matter what is done, you’re never going to prevent these kids, who are hyped up on hormones and are trying to explore their sexuality, and live on their phones, [from taking pictures].

“During a pandemic when [young people] can’t even see their friends …obviously revenge porn cases are going to rocket. It’s a pressure-cooker scenario,” she says.

But if colleges can’t prevent young people from taking or creating these images, what can they do to intervene in the next stage of the cycle? How can they reduce the risk of the images being distributed without consent?

The first step is to make sure that students are being taught about what consent actually means, says Isaacs. This should include helping them to understand that they need to seek consent for actions that they take online, as well as in person.

“We talk about rape, consent and explicit consent. However, we need to talk about it in an online sense,” Isaacs explains. “Although we’re dealing with sexual consent when it occurs in person, as soon as it goes online, it seems to [be taking place in] another realm and it shouldn’t be.”

In order to teach students about how consent applies both on and offline, college staff will need to familiarise themselves with the current laws around revenge porn. So, what does the law have to say?

According to a fact sheet produced by the Ministry of Justice in 2015 (when current legislation came into effect), revenge porn is the sharing of “private, sexual materials” without someone’s consent and “with the purpose of causing embarrassment or distress”.

“The offence applies both online and offline, and to images which are shared electronically or in a more traditional way, so it includes the uploading of images on the internet, sharing by text and email, or showing someone a physical or electronic image,” the fact sheet states.

Students need to be aware that showing a friend a sexually explicit image of another person on their phone without that person’s consent is not OK. They also need to understand that an image doesn’t have to involve nudity for it to be considered sexually explicit.

“Sexual material not only covers images that show the genitals but also anything that a reasonable person would consider to be sexual, so this could be a picture of someone who is engaged in sexual behaviour or posing in a sexually provocative way,” the fact sheet says.

The stakes of committing these crimes are high: those convicted could face a sentence of up to two years in prison.

While making students aware of these facts might help them to avoid perpetrating the crimes, they could still fall victim to revenge porn themselves. It’s important to stress that the law is on the side of the victim. Even if a student is under 18, and laws around creating and distributing child pornography come into effect, the police will not automatically want to prosecute a victim. In 2016, Outcome 21 was established, which allows UK police to manage incidents whereby images are shared between young people of the same age and within a healthy relationship.

So, what should students do if this happens to them? And how should college staff respond if a student comes to them seeking support?

Sophie Mortimer is helpline manager at the Revenge Porn Helpline, a service supporting people aged 18 and over who are experiencing intimate-image abuse (0345 6000 459). She says the first thing to do if a student discloses that someone has shared images without their consent is to offer reassurance.

“First, we would say: stay calm and don’t panic. You’ve done nothing wrong and what has happened is not your fault. And there is help and support available,” she says.

Mortimer’s next piece of advice is to tell the student to collect proof of the offence, if it has happened online. “Collect evidence while you can: screenshots of any content that is online, and try to collect URLs, the date and time of the posting and if you know who has done it. You may want to get the content deleted straightaway but it’s worth getting some advice first,” she says.

Once the student has gathered any evidence that they can, the next step should be to report the incident to the police. “Going to the police can feel like a difficult step to take, but the 101 non-emergency number is a good place to start. If you are in danger, call 999,” says Mortimer.

For students under 18, the offence can also be reported to Child Exploitation and Online Protection command or the Internet Watch Foundation.

As well as reporting the crime to the authorities, you should report it to the platform or website it has appeared on, Mortimer adds. This should be a straightforward process as the tools to flag a post are usually built into websites.

“Most social media platforms and adult sites will have reporting tools, but if you’re having problems or need support with this, please get in touch with the Revenge Porn Helpline [if you are 18 or over, or Childline if you are under 18] and we will do our best to help,” she says.

Of course, all of this advice relies on students feeling comfortable enough to make a disclosure in the first place. This means that colleges need to work to destigmatise the issue for victims.

Unfortunately, this is something that isn’t always happening right now, says Kat Tremlett, a helpline practitioner at Professionals Online Safety Helpline (0344 381 4772).

“Sadly, professionals working with young people can often respond in ways that may inadvertently be seen to blame the victims in these scenarios,” Tremlett explains. “[This can] mean that young people are even less likely to talk to adults they trust because of the societal shame associated with the actions that have taken place.”

Isaacs agrees that feelings of guilt and blame can be a real stumbling block for tackling the issue. She stresses that someone who is a victim of this type of crime should never be blamed for what has happened to them.

“‘Revenge porn’ is a really badly worded term because it insinuates the person in the content has done something wrong and someone else is seeking revenge,” she explains. “It’s similar, in a way, to the phrase ‘child pornography’, as that has implied consent; what we should use is ‘images of child abuse’.

“In the same way, we need to not think of it as ‘revenge porn’ but the distribution of private images of a person without consent.”

Bringing the problem out into the open and working to eradicate victim blaming is perhaps the most useful thing that colleges can do.

Other than allowing it to be the norm to share everything, whether it belongs to you or not, colleges need to normalise the practice of speaking up when something goes wrong. And for that, they need to create a culture of trust, in which young people know that they can come to college staff for help, without the risk of being judged or blamed for their actions.

Grainne Hallahan is senior content writer at Tes

This article originally appeared in the 15 January 2021 issue under the headline “How FE can help students reduce revenge porn risks”