My co-workers tell me that there are plenty of websites out there with images and footage of naked people who agreed to be photographed in such revealing conditions. But there are also so-called “revenge porn” sites that post intimate personal photos and videos of people who didn’t consent. Facing a lawsuit from federal regulators, the operator of one such site has agreed to get out of the revenge porn business.

The Federal Trade Commission complaint [PDF] against the operator of a now-defunct site, isanybodydown.com, alleges he used deception to acquire the images and videos he posted online.

He openly asked readers to anonymously send in nude photos of other people and to include personal information like full name, age, location, phone number, website, and a link to the subject’s Facebook profile.

The site’s operator also posed as a woman on Craigslist, where he would send photos that he claimed were his to other women while requesting that they send back revealing pictures of their own. The women who did respond would then have their pictures posted on the site without permission or knowledge, according to the FTC.

Finally, there was the site’s “bounty system” that allowed readers to pay a listing fee of $20 to request that others find and post photos of a specific person in exchange for a reward of at least $100.

Anyone who complained about their images ending up on the site were then directed to sites that the operator also owned, where they could pay upwards of $500 to have the images removed, without being told that the owner of this removal service was the same person who had posted the pictures to begin with.

As part of his settlement [PDF] with the FTC, the site operator must destroy all images and personal contact information he collected.

“This behavior is not only illegal but reprehensible,” said Jessica Rich, director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection. “I am pleased that as a result of this settlement, the illegally collected images and information will be deleted, and this individual can never return to the so-called ‘revenge porn’ business.”

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