Porn, privacy, and pain: how image-based abuse tears women’s lives apart

More women are being threatened with the release of their intimate photos or videos, as cases peak during the Covid-19 pandemic

Survivors in Hong Kong, Taiwan and Malaysia are struggling to have this content removed from online platforms, where hundreds of entries portraying sexual violence can be found

Published: 9:30am, 29 May 2021

This is the first in a series of stories on image-based abuse supported by the Judith Neilson Institute’s Asian Stories project, in collaboration with The Korea Times, Indonesia’s Tempo magazine, the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism, and Manila-based ABS-CBN. Cat Thomas, Yon Sineat and Kong Meta contributed reporting. The piece contains descriptions of a sexual nature. This story has been made freely available as a public service to our readers. Please consider supporting SCMP’s journalism by subscribing.

Laura*, an office worker from Hong Kong, recently found out that some of her most private moments had been circulating on the internet – for about a decade.

Thousands have been able to pry into her personal life through the screens of computers, mobile phones, and tablets.

“I was shocked,” she said. “To put it simply, an admirer found a video on a porn website and I was in the video. It was filmed secretly.”

Laura, who is now in her late 20s, only became aware a year ago about the existence of the footage – shot without her consent when she was a university student.

“The film is 10 years old and yet he could still recognise me,” she said, referring to a work colleague who had been courting her for months. At first, he seemed concerned about her well-being, but his manner changed when Laura said she was not interested in a relationship with him.