Source · Select Committees · Women and Equalities Committee

Recommendation 11

11

Introduce a swift, inexpensive statutory civil process for non-consensual intimate image abuse.

Recommendation
The Government should take a holistic approach to legislating against NCII abuse by introducing a swift, inexpensive statutory civil process, as has been established in other jurisdictions such as British Columbia in Canada. Doing so would recognise survivors’ wishes to access redress beyond the criminal law, as well as empower them to take fast and effective action towards having their NCII taken down or blocked. Such a regime should be alongside and underpin the creation of a registry of NCII content—overseen by an expert body—that internet infrastructure providers are requested to take all reasonable steps to prevent access to. The statutory regime should enable civil courts to make orders, including: 53 a. designating an image as NCII content and ordering its inclusion on a dedicated registry for the purposes of having IIPs take action to prevent access to that content; b. prohibiting the individual from distributing the intimate image; c. requiring the individual to delete any images; d. requiring the individual to take down or disable access to an intimate image; e. requiring the individual to pay compensation for harm caused; f. requiring the provider and/or end user of a social media service, relevant electronic service or designated internet service to remove an intimate image from the service; g. requiring a hosting service provider who hosts an intimate image to cease hosting the image. (Recommendation, Paragraph 71)
Government Response

A response document is linked to this report, dated 20 May 2025. Response attribution to this recommendation has not been verified. Read the response document ↗