If you think posting naked photos of someone out of spite is a funny thing to do, a) you’re wrong and b) the law is not on your side. Kevin Bollaert, former operator of the now-defunct revenge porn site ‘ugotposted.com,’ just got sentenced to 18 well-deserved years behind bars.
‘ugotposted’ hosted more than 10,000 sexually explicit images of women posted without their knowledge or consent. Bollaert, who ran the revenge porn hub from 2010 to 2013, supplemented the site’s primary income by demanding hundreds of dollars from people to take their photos down. He was convicted by a California court last week on charges of identity theft and extortion, sentenced to 18 years in jail (although he could be eligible for parole after 10) and charged a $10,000 fine.
Bollaert’s landmark case—the first conviction of a revenge porn website operator—is part of a broader movement towards a more proactive stance against this particularly despicable form of online trolling. Stamping out revenge porn entirely will take a much larger cultural shift, but sending a clear message that this form of internet hate crime is not tolerable is a good start. [NBC San Diego via Engadget]
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