What is the legal status of intimate photos sent to your (now) ex-partner after a break-up? When I met my now ex-boyfriend, we were both already over 18. I took digital nude pictures of myself and transferred them electronically to him, i. e. I was sexting him. He didn't specifically ask for them, I just wanted to pleasure him. There wasn't much accompanying text to the nudes. Now, after the break-up, I thought about these photos. I wonder who owns them now and if I could make him delete them. But I'm not planning to take any legal steps, I'm just curious. I'm also not aware of him posting them anywhere and I do not suspect him to, so this is not about revenge porn. I found an article on Vice.com, but it is a bit unclear: According to Olivarius, you may have a case if a former partner refuses to delete your nudes after you’ve asked them to, but proving guilt in court in this situation will be extremely difficult. What is the legal status of nude pictures sent to a now ex-partner after a break-up? I saw this earlier question but it doesn't contain an answer to my question as the cases discussed are quite different.
I assume these are digital photos that were electronically transferred (not prints physically delivered). If they were prints physically delivered, he owns those prints, since you used to own them but you unconditionally transferred ownership to him by giving them. No backsies under the law. The photos are protected by copyright law, which means that the person who took the pictures has the exclusive right to make copies, disseminate them, and authorize making copies. In order for anyone to make a copy, they need permission – a license – from you. In the world of pre-planned business deals, the copyright holder writes up a document granting B some right to use the protected material, which typically means "you can install it on your various devices but may not give copies to others". In this case, however, you didn't create an explicit written license. So if this ends up in court, the question is what implicit license you granted. The courts will not decide that you granted him the license to unrestrictedly sell or give away copies of the protected material. The most likely outcome would be that he can only keep his copy, i.e. he will not be forced to erase the copy that you sent him. What the courts would do is try to discern what license you most likely intended to grant to him. There is a provision in copyright law that allows a licensee to make backup copies of a computer program (17 USC 117), but a digital photo is not a computer program. So the lifespan of the copy that you sent would be the lifespan of the phone (I assume) that you sent it to. Since actually using a digital photo technically requires making a copy (from disk storage to computational memory), there is a legal direction (dead-end) that you could go where the photo could exist on the phone, but never be opened again. Again, the courts would have to discern what license you probably intended w.r.t. ever opening the photo – obviously you intended that the file could be opened / viewed any number of times. You could argue that the license which you granted was conditional, i.e. "you can have and use these pictures as long as we are a thing", but establishing that this was part of the license would be tricky. Free digital content often has some "as long as" condition attached to it, i.e. "you can use this program as long as you are affiliated with University of Whatever". I don't consider a conditional license to be a ridiculous interpretation, on the other hand the particular court (judge) might decide that people who sext should be forced to live with the unpleasant consequences of their decisions. If we exclude such a line of thinking, I don't see a compelling counter-argument that your ex-partner inequitably loses a right by construing the license as conditional. I don't know if there is any case law that addresses this: at any rate, copyright law would severely limit what he could do with the pictures (the tort "invasion of privacy" also limits dissemination).
Law is not science or math or solid logic. However - “The two identical color passport-style photos” makes it clear that for each person in question there are two identical photo documents. External to this passage is the background knowledge of what passport and other identification photos are like. They show an individual. And, the photos are not to prove your relationship, but are a way to connect the people on the documents with the faces of the people in question.
Think of a website that has gives no option for the users to delete what they have posted -but still the users can delete their account completely. That's easy - this is exactly how all StackExchange sites (including this one) work :-). See for example: How does deleting work? on meta.SE. Is it against the right to erasure mentioned here as a part of GDPR? No, it is not (otherwise StackExchange would be in rather big trouble). The "right to be forgotten" is subject to limitations. Most importantly, it only applies to personal data. Personal data is defined as (GDPR, art.4): any information relating to an identified or identifiable natural person (‘data subject’) If what you posted contains no personal information about you, it is not "relating to" you. The details are complicated (as usual, see e.g. The GDPR: What exactly is personal data?), but "personal data" is things about you (your name, your address, your sexual history, maybe even your IP address). On the other hand, if someone asks how to solve a programming problem, and you write an answer explaining what API to call, that answer is not personal data. In addition to that, even personal data may be retained if the data controller has a need to retain that information. This is also covered in article 4. For example, the controller may retain information "for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims" - otherwise you could buy something online without paying, and then ask the seller to forget about your purchases so they cannot collect the outstanding payment. So, in summary: A website will need to allow users to delete or hide personal data that they posted - such as their user profile information, or personal information in their posts. That does not mean they are allowed to delete entire posts - it is enough if personal information is redacted or anonymized. The website may be allowed to retain that information (hidden) if they can show legitimate interest - for example billing information, or posts that are the subject of a lawsuit. The StackExchange network, for example, covers this by allowing users to: disassociate posts from their account delete their account entirely (thus effectively disassociating all posts from personal information) asking a moderator for redaction of personal data
Yes, it is illegal in North Carolina, which defines your sex as what's on your birth certificate. At any point in your transition, even when it's long complete, you'll still have to use the restroom for the gender on your birth certificate (hypothetically assuming the law is still in place). See e.g. this CNN coverage and this followup. Will you actually be arrested? Probably only if there's a complaint. The police haven't yet figured out how they're supposed to enforce this law.
I believe in this case, your company (OrgX) is a data processor and your customer's organization (OrgY) is the data controller. OrgY is responsible for establishing a lawful basis for sending you (OrgX) the personal data for their employees. Note that consent is just one of six lawful bases outlined in article 6(1). I'm no expert, but I believe OrgY's admin can claim they have a legitimate interest in sending their employee's personal data for training sake. In either case, the data processor is not responsible for establishing the lawful basis for processing. Of course, data processors aren't completely off the hook. GDPR outlines specific requirements for data processors (see chapter 4, particularly article 28).
It's probably due to GDPR. You will see that around 2018-05-25 when GDPR came into force, many US-based websites changed their terms of service to increase the age requirement from 13 (age below which the U.S. COPPA law applies) to 16 for European users. For example, here are Stack Exchange's terms of service from 2018-05-02, mentioning 13 years, and here is the version one day later mentioning 16 years. The GPDR allows companies to process personal data under a variety of legal bases, such as “legitimate interest”, “necessary for performing a contract”, or “consent”. But children are not able to give consent in this context. If a website wants consent from a child for some data processing, Art 8 GDPR requires the service to make “reasonable efforts” to check with the parents first. This reasonable effort is more effort than just banning children from using the services. The GDPR itself does not define exactly when someone is a child for these purposes – it lets individual EU member states define the exact age limit, which may be anything between 13 and 16 years. Thus, websites that definitely do not want to have to comply with Art 8 GDPR take the upper bound of that limit and mention in their terms of service that the service is only intended for persons aged 16 or older. The text of Art 8 GDPR is: (1) Where point (a) of Article 6(1) applies, in relation to the offer of information society services directly to a child, the processing of the personal data of a child shall be lawful where the child is at least 16 years old. Where the child is below the age of 16 years, such processing shall be lawful only if and to the extent that consent is given or authorised by the holder of parental responsibility over the child. Member States may provide by law for a lower age for those purposes provided that such lower age is not below 13 years. (2) The controller shall make reasonable efforts to verify in such cases that consent is given or authorised by the holder of parental responsibility over the child, taking into consideration available technology. (3) Paragraph 1 shall not affect the general contract law of Member States such as the rules on the validity, formation or effect of a contract in relation to a child.
The simple way is to post a picture of you and the widget to a site like Flickr. A more expensive way (but with rather more weight) is to get a Notary to certify they saw you and the widget on January 9th. Both the above provide evidence you had access to the widget before January 10th, but neither prove you owned it. For that, you would need a dated (possibly even notarized) bill of sale or similar - but if you acquired the widget via a gift, that won't work. A signed witness statement from the giver would probably serve (and the statement could legitimately be created when you are prosecuted). None of the above are unforgeable - but you don't need that. Depending on how the law is written, you will only need to show ownership on the balance of probabilities, or you might only need to show reasonable doubt that you didn't own it on 9th January.
As stated in the answer to What is considered &quot;public&quot; in the context of taking videos or audio recordings?; if either of the participants is in Australia than unless all parties have given consent then the recording is illegal. Notwithstanding its legality, property in the recording vests in the person who made it. There is no law against him keeping it. There is no law against him publishing it unless the material contained is offensive, hate speech or defamatory (see Customer feedback gathering in Australia).