MIAMI (CBSMiami) – A young woman, who we will refer to as Emily, is speaking out after nude photos of her were stolen and put on the internet.
“I want to do this because if I can help any girl that this might be happening to who feels alone, know you’re not alone,” she said.
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For the past 10 months Emily, who lives and works in South Florida, has been harassed over private photos she took of herself six years ago while in college.
“At the time I took these photos I didn’t think I was doing anything stupid. I didn’t see anything wrong with it because I wasn’t sharing them with people,” she said. “These are my private photos that were stolen from me and shared everywhere without my consent to harass me and terrorize me.”
She believed the photos were safe because she had them stored in a private file on Snapchat
“The thing is this is a different generation. For us everything is digital. Everything is on the phone, everything is saved on an app,” she explained.
Early last year she received a direct message on her Twitter account telling her there were nude photos of her online. Emily didn’t believe it until she saw the actual website.
CBS4’s Lisa Petrillo asked her what went through her mind at that time.
“Immediate panic. My first instinct was to call my mom and she ran over and there were so many tears and anxiety because I didn’t know, at that point, the extent of what they had and what was going on,” Emily said.
What followed was a nightmare she could never have imagined. The hackers sent messages with links to her private personal pictures to almost everyone in her life, including her work.
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“Basically, any single way they could get in contact with me they tried. Every single member of my family,” she said. “It wasn’t every single day I would get a text, it was every 20 minutes I would get a text. It immediately started an anxiety and panic attack for me.”
They never asked for money, she said this was all about terrorizing her.
“These people shared private details about my life, where people can find me and knew where I lived and how to contact me, so it became a physical safety issue,” she said through tears.
She went to the police but said they were little help.
“To be quite honest, he didn’t take it seriously. It was judgmental, side-eye. He basically told me because I wasn’t a child legally by age, that there was probably nothing they could do for me,” she said.
Emily shut down all her social media accounts. She has a new private, unlisted phone number and in recent weeks the harassment has slowed down.
“Why is it important for you to do this interview?“ asked Petrillo.
“If I can educate a single parent on talking with your kids, talk to them about how privacy is not sacred. It’s not at all, especially in the digital world,” she explained. “Once things are out there, they are out there forever. I will never ever be able to fully get those things back. They will always be out there in the world being traded, being seen and that’s horrible. If I could help protect any girl, even one.”
This is still not over for Emily. An investigation is underway, but no arrests have been.
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Cyber intelligence units in law enforcement told CBS4 this is a huge problem, not only for thousands of women in Florida but around the world.
