Arizona Gov. Brewer signs broad ‘revenge porn’ bill

“Revenge porn” is now a felony in Arizona. Perpetrators who post sexually explicit images or videos online without a person’s consent are subject to jail time and may be required to register as sex offenders — even if the person in the photo is unrecognizable or faceless

Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer has signed a bill aimed at stopping jilted lovers from posting explicit pictures of their former flames online to get revenge.

The measure sponsored by Republican Rep. J.D. Mesnard of Chandler makes it a felony to post nude photos of a person without their written consent.

Legal experts and civil rights activists warn that the new law might be an unconstitutional infringement on free speech.

“It’s extremely troubling,” Lee Rowland, staff attorney at the ACLU, told the Daily Dot, because the law“also applies to pictures where the person isn’t identifiable.”

“So posting a disembodied picture of a woman’s breast – so long as you ‘should have known’ they didn’t consent – could support a felony charge,” she said. “I think the law is overbroad and covers a significant amount of fully-protected speech.”

The law also defines some postings as acts of domestic violence.

University of Arizona law professor Derek Bambauer cited a hypothetical situation in which someone had an image of Monica Lewinsky and President Bill Clinton engaged in a sex act.

“I publish it in the newspaper,” he explained to the Phoenix New Times. “Can I be prosecuted? Clearly not – it’s a matter of public concern (the president is having an affair with an intern, a government employee), so the First Amendment blocks the prosecution.”

Scott Greenfield writes about many of this law’s infirmities here.

The new law is one of many measures being considered across the nation in response to the posting of “revenge porn” that has been made easier by the growth of social networking sites. Last year, California made it a misdemeanor to post such images.

The Senate and House both unanimously approved the bill last week and Brewer signed it Wednesday.