Telegram: Where women’s nudes are shared without consent – BBC News

A BBC investigation has found that women’s intimate photos are being shared in large groups on Telegram.

The BBC has been monitoring 18 Telegram channels and 24 groups in countries ranging from Russia to Brazil, and Kenya to Malaysia. The total number of subscribers is nearly two million.

Personal details like home addresses and parents’ phone numbers were posted alongside explicit pictures.

We saw group administrators asking members to send intimate images of ex-partners, colleagues or fellow-students to an automated account, so they could be published without revealing the identity of the sender.

Telegram now says it has more than half a billion active users worldwide – that’s more than Twitter – with many attracted by its emphasis on privacy.

Millions moved to Telegram in January 2021 from WhatsApp, which changed its privacy terms.

Despite Telegram’s reputation for privacy, only the “secret chat” option provides end-to-end encryption, which ensures just the two people talking can see the message. It’s the default setting on secure chat apps like Signal and WhatsApp.

“According to Telegram and its owner, they don’t want to censor users,” says Natalia Krapiva, tech legal counsel at digital rights group Access Now.

But our research has shown this light-touch approach to moderation has led Telegram to become a haven for the leaking and sharing of intimate images.

Telegram does not have a dedicated policy to tackle the non-consensual sharing of intimate images, but its terms of service make users agree “not to post illegal pornographic content on publicly viewable Telegram channels, bots, etc”.

It also has an in-app reporting feature across both public and private groups, and channels where users can report pornography.To test how rigorously Telegram enforced its policies, we found and reported 100 images as pornography via the in-app reporting feature. One month later, 96 remained accessible. We could not locate four others, as they were in groups which we could no longer access.

Disturbingly, while we were investigating these groups, an account from Russia also tried to sell us a folder containing child abuse videos for less than the price of a coffee.

We reported it to Telegram and the Metropolitan Police, but two months later the post and the channel were still there. The account was only removed after we contacted the Telegram media team.

Source: Telegram: Where women’s nudes are shared without consent – BBC News

More than one in four women have been victims of abuse by a partner, ‘appalling’ new study shows | UK News | Sky News

The true figure is likely to be even higher, since victims are often unwilling to report their abusers – and findings were pre-pandemic where abuse in the home increased.

Analysis of hundreds of studies, published in medical journal The Lancet, suggests 27% of women aged 15 to 49 have experienced physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence in their lifetime.

Around one in seven (13%) said this had occurred in the past year – the equivalent of 492 million women worldwide.

The study is said to be the largest analysis of violence against women who are, or have been in relationships, to date.

Source: More than one in four women have been victims of abuse by a partner, ‘appalling’ new study shows | UK News | Sky News

Scot flashed penis and used sex toy in public leaving onlookers shocked – Daily Record

Former soldier Chloe Thompson, who is originally from Glasgow but moved to the Teesside area in 2011, was previously placed on the sex offenders’ register for assaulting an underage girl.A Glasgow-born sex offender has admitted exposing her penis, (sic) using a sex toy and masturbating in public.

Chloe Thompson committed the “grossly offensive” acts in daylight and in front of shocked members of the public, a court was told.

At one point, three children saw the former soldier exposing herself (sic) and thrusting her (sic) hips in the window of her home, TeesideLive reports.

Previously convicted as Andrew McNab, the defendant had been put on the sex offenders’ register and made subject to notification requirements in 2011 for sexually assaulting an underage girl.

But she (sic) was hauled back before courts in May last year for breaching her (sic) notification requirements for the 11th time.

Source: Scot flashed penis and used sex toy in public leaving onlookers shocked – Daily Record

School sent letter to parents of six-year-old warning of ‘transphobic behaviour’ | Daily Mail Online

Sally and Nigel Rowe were told by their sons’ headteacher that pupils could be seen as transphobic if they were unable ‘to believe a transgender person is a ”real” male or female.’

  • Parents from the Isle of Wight were warned their children may be ‘transphobic’
  • Their children’s Church of England school declared that pupils not using desired pronouns or adopted names would be seen as exhibiting ‘transphobic behaviour’
  • Nigel and Sally Rowe pulled their kids out of school over uniform row 
  • Their six-year-old son came home confused that a kid in his class wore a dress 
  • Mr Rowe and Mrs Rowe say the rules ‘confused’ their sons and were too complex
  • The couple argued a six-year-old is not able to make decisions on their pronouns 

Source: School sent letter to parents of six-year-old warning of ‘transphobic behaviour’ | Daily Mail Online

Stonewall is about politics not common sense | Comment | The Times

“Everything is politics,” said the novelist Thomas Mann. The problem, he should have added, is that we only ever realise this when confronted with opposing views.

Stonewall’s success came with its capacity to promote its training programmes and diversity schemes not as political interventions but as compassionate, progressive measures designed to create inclusive and tolerant workplaces. That doing so meant ignoring women’s insistence on maintaining their sex-based rights rarely caused concern.

However, women such as JK Rowling and Rosie Duffield would not let women’s rights be relinquished without a fight. Maya Forstater lost her job after saying that people cannot change their biological sex, but fought back to win an appeal in an employment tribunal, ensuring that the conflict between gender self-identification and sex-based rights was recognised and debated in public.

More recently, the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has begun to question Stonewall’s influence. After the appointment of Lady Falkner of Margravine in 2020 as its chairwoman, the EHRC withdrew from Stonewall’s diversity champions programme. Lady Falkner has defended the right to hold “gender critical beliefs” and noted that there was “‘genuine public concern” that trans rights conflicted with women’s rights. She has said that women have the right to question transgender identity without being abused, stigmatised or risking their jobs. Last month, the EHRC called on the governments in Holyrood and Westminster to pause before enacting laws governing legal gender recognition and conversion therapy.

Suddenly Stonewall spies politics. The charity is leading a coalition of organisations, including the Good Law Project and Mermaids, in rallying international support behind its criticisms of the EHRC.

The EHRC has said: “The way the commission is governed, and commissioners appointed, is set out in the Equality Act, and has not changed since the commission was established.” Indeed, until August 2020, the EHRC was led by David Isaac who, in a previous role, ran Stonewall.

It is only now that the EHRC is raising valid concerns that critics are labelling it as political. Mann was right. Everything is political. But this is a good thing. We need to step out of our consensual bubbles and engage in debate.

Source: Stonewall is about politics not common sense | Comment | The Times

Prince Andrew agrees to settle Virginia Giuffre sex assault claim | Australasian Lawyer

Prince Andrew, after years of public humiliation over sexual abuse allegations that rocked the British royal family, is sparing himself a US courtroom showdown by settling with his accuser.

The second son of Queen Elizabeth II has consistently denied Virginia Giuffre’s claim that he was one of several men to whom Jeffrey Epstein “lent” her for sexual abuse when she was a teenager. But his failure to get her lawsuit dismissed last month set off a cascade of repercussions, culminating in Buckingham Palace stripping him of honorific titles and royal patronages.

Facing the possibility of trial later this year, Andrew, 61, agreed to settle the case for an undisclosed sum, according to court papers filed Tuesday. The deal was announced by Giuffre’s lawyer David Boies in a letter to the judge overseeing the case. While the terms were confidential, Andrew is required to make “a substantial donation” to Giuffre’s charity supporting victim’s rights.

Source: Prince Andrew agrees to settle Virginia Giuffre sex assault claim | Australasian Lawyer

French court recognises transgender woman as the mother of her(sic) child

A court of appeal in the southern French city of Toulouse has just ruled that a woman (sic) who was born male should be considered the mother of the child she (sic) conceived with her (sic) partner before her (sic) sex change.

In what is a first for France’s judiciary, a court of appeal recognised  the right of a male-to-female transgender person – who conceived a child with her (sic) male reproductive system – to be named as the mother on the child’s birth certificate.

Since 2016, French law has authorised gender reassignment without sexual reassignment that has allowed distinct legal and biological realities to coexist.

Source: French court recognises transgender woman as the mother of her child

House of Lords is latest to say no to Stonewall after mother of all rows | News | The Sunday Times

The House of Lords has abandoned a workplace inclusivity programme run by Stonewall following a row about the use of gender-neutral language in legislation.

It has become the latest organisation to pull out of the charity’s Diversity Champions programme under which participants pay for advice on creating a supportive working environment.

Concerns have been raised about the LGBTQ+ charity’s position on language. It has previously told organisations to replace the word “mother” with “parent who has given birth”.

Stonewall says more than 900 organisations in the UK have signed up to the scheme, which it claims is “the leading employers’ programme for ensuring all LGBTQ+ staff are free to be themselves in the workplace”.

However, in recent months large public organisations have started to pull out, including Ofcom, the media watchdog, the Equality and Human Rights Commission and the Cabinet Office, Government Equalities Office and Ministry of Justice.

Source: House of Lords is latest to say no to Stonewall after mother of all rows | News | The Sunday Times

Victorian parliament launches first step in full decriminalisation of sex work with legislation repeal – ABC News

Victoria has become the third jurisdiction in Australia to decriminalise sex work.

The repealing of the Sex Work Act 1994 is the first step in a two-year long process that will see licensing and zoning regulations dramatically changed, street sex work decriminalised and STI testing mandates scrapped for sex workers.

The bill passed just before 8.30pm on Thursday, 24 votes to 10. Having fought for the changes since the 1980s, former sex worker and Reason Party MP Fiona Patten spearheaded debate leading to the new laws.

“Unfortunately, the Andrews Labor government has tried to ram through another piece of legislation without safeguards in place and without time for proper consultation and scrutiny,” Shadow Minister for Consumer Affairs Roma Britnell said.

The removal of offences and criminal penalties for individuals participating in the act of consensual sex work in most circumstances, the amending of advertising controls and introduction of anti-discrimination protections for sex workers is slated to begin this year as early as March.

Source: Victorian parliament launches first step in full decriminalisation of sex work with legislation repeal – ABC News

Fertility clinics’ past breaches exposed – Women’s Forum Australia

This week, Leiden hospital in the Netherlands revealed the latest chapter in an ever-expanding corpus of scandal surrounding the historical operation of fertility clinics.The paternity of at least 21 children conceived through the clinic has been traced to a single doctor, Dr Jos Beek (d. 2019), who worked there between 1973 and 1998. Dr Beek inseminated his patients in the clinic using his own sperm while telling these women it came from anonymous donors.

In addition to the 21 individuals Dr Beek is known to have fathered, there may be “dozens more” yet to find.

It is now known that at least two other doctors from the Netherlands – Dr Jan Karbaat and Dr Jan Wildschut (d. 2009) – cheated in the evolutionary stakes by fathering multiple children (at least 49, in the case of Karbaat and at least 17 in the case of Wildschut) through their unsuspecting patients.

The Donor Child Foundation, a voluntary group that assists donor-conceived children, avers knowledge of two further Dutch doctors implicated in similar “doctor conception”. Dr Donald Cline, in Indiana, fathered more than 50 children; Dr Norman Barwin in Ottawa, Canada, at least 11;  Dr Cecil Jacobson, perhaps as many as 75.

The case of Jacobson involves multiple types of fraud: he injected his patients with the hormone hCG (a hormone normally released in pregnancy) which produced false positive results to fertility tests. These allowed Jacobson to claim his fertility treatment had been successful and to invoice his patients accordingly. The pretence could be maintained through the early stages of pregnancy while Jacobson identified a “foetus” in granular ultrasound images, pointing to shapes later found by a court to have been nothing more than nearby organs or faecal matter. At some point, these women who had never in fact been pregnant, would be told by Jacobson that their babies had died.

Others of Jacobson’s patients were successful in becoming pregnant using sperm ostensibly sourced from anonymous, screened donors, whose identity was known only to Jacobson. The courts later heard that no such donor program had ever been established; Jacobson supplied the sperm himself.

Source: Fertility clinics’ past breaches exposed – Women’s Forum Australia