[UPDATE] Montreal woman calls out Twitter for ignoring 'creepshot' concerns

If you're a woman who's been to the beach, travelled on public transit or even walked down the street, you might be the subject of a "creepshot."

Creepshots are photos taken of women in public, without their consent, and then posted to social media. They typically show women's breasts, buttocks and sometimes their faces.

"Some men actually have Twitter accounts dedicated to creepshots they've taken of women from their own neighbourhoods," Yevgeniya Ivanyutenko tells As It Happens guest host Helen Mann. "So they will literally follow women down the street taking photos and video."

Ivanyutenko is a Montreal based sex worker and educator. She's been active on Twitter in calling them out and trying to stop users who post these images. According to Ivanyutenko some accounts target underage girls as well.

"There are some candid photographers, as they like to call themselves, who like to take photos of women who shop at Victoria's Secret PINK and PINK is a brand for young teenage girls," Ivanyutenko explains.

Ivanyutenko says she's found a number of online communities that request and share these invasive photos, apparently without consequence. She says they use hashtags to share the images more widely.

"Twitter is just one way. It's the easiest way to disseminate them because it's basically an online platform allowing anyone to garner their own following and then send the photos to their followers directly," Ivanyutenko says. "A lot of the accounts, the most popular ones, have anywhere between 10 and 50,000 followers."

Ivanyutenko says she's tried reporting the hashtags and accounts to Twitter, but to date received no response from the social media company. 


"Now there are more people even becoming aware of the fact this is completely legal to do, even in Canada," Ivanyutenko explains. "The people who disseminate and take these photos, they flaunt this fact to women. They will brazenly take photographs of women even when they notice."

Ivanyutenko recites a post that was made in a Reddit forum dedicated to "creepshots" that she says summarizes the argument photographers have given her to try to justify their accounts.
 

Ivanyutenko says she's been harassed for speaking out against the accounts. She is now calling on Patty Hadju, Minister of Status of Women of Canada, to introduce legislation that makes the dissemination of the images punishable by law.

"It is a huge violation of privacy," Ivanyutenko says. "I think that as women we already get enough. We already get street harassment, cat-calling, sexual assault and then on top of that we also have to worry about someone walking behind us on the street taking photos and videos of us?"

On Tuesday, As It Happens guest host Helen Mann spoke with Minister Patty Hajdu. She has assembled an advisory council that she says will help the government develop a strategy on gender-based violence, including online violence. Listen here: