Illustrated By Emily Kowzan.When you think of the worst (non-violent) thing someone can do to another person, revenge porn is up there. If you know someone who's had revenge porn posted of them, you know that it pretty much ruins lives. So, we were understandably ecstatic when Hunter Moore, the revenge porn mogul and founder of the infamous (now defunct) isanyoneup.com, was arrested yesterday and indicted on multiple charges of conspiracy to commit email hacking by a federal grand jury.
Moore, who has been called "the most hated man on the Internet," was one of the first to conceive of the practice of collecting nude photos and video submitted by bitter exes and posting them online, complete with full names and Facebook snapshots of the victims. His reputation as a class-A sleaze monster — fed by numerous interviews in which he claimed not to care about his victims' emotional damage, even if they committed suicide — made him the poster child of a thriving web culture based on objectifying women and tearing them to shreds behind anonymous commenter handles.
Of course, while the fact that this man is off the streets is unequivocally great news, it's more than a little infuriating that he got nabbed for paying someone to hack into some email accounts. It's the hacking, not the revenge porn itself, that finally landed him in the hot seat. While posting photos of women without their consent for the entire Internet to pounce on is the very definition of scumbag behavior, it's something that remains perfectly legal. While some states are working on legislation to make it a crime to post revenge porn, there's a very limited amount of recourse victims can pursue — and very little to deter future Hunter Moores from ruining more lives. So, in the age of sexting and the eminently hackable Snapchat, discretion should be the name of the game. After all, safe is way, way better than sorry. (Time)