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'Stupid old white people' revenge porn ban won't work, insists selfie-peddler

A dish best eaten cold? No, it's more like hot cakes

The governor of California has outlined plans to make revenge porn illegal - but the inventor of this online phenomenon has warned the "stupid white man" that his plan is destined to fail.

State Governor Jerry Brown passed Senate Bill 255 yesterday, which makes it illegal to post clearly identifiable nude pictures of a person without their permission.

But this scheme has been rubbished by Hunter Moore, founder of the controversial revenge porn website Is Anyone Up, who was once described as "the most hated man on the internet" in a Rolling Stone profile.

His website was the first to allow disgruntled ex-partners to upload graphic shots of their former lovers, along with their name, city of residence, occupation and social media profile details. At its peak, the site was receiving 30 million page views a month and netting $10,000 in advertising revenue. Moore shut Is Anyone Up? down at the end of last year after drawing international criticism and even reportedly being stabbed with a pen by an angry woman whose pictures were on the site.

Many of the images uploaded to Moore's site were nude selfies, sent by young women and men to their lovers.

He told The Register: "This doesn't stop anything. If you read the bill it is just for peeping toms, not for selfies, which is all revenge porn really is.”

"Also the communications decency act still protects site owners and a site owner just needs to move his servers. And why would he give up information on the submitter [of revenge porn images]? This stops nothing. It will just make revenge porn bigger by driving traffic, because people are talking about it.”

"These stupid old white people are even more stupid to think they can stop it,” said the self-described “small town Christian boy.”

“We are animals. We are sexual. Maybe they need a class on reality: don't give your kid a phone."

Under the new Californian law, anyone caught uploading posting nude pictures without the subject's consent or with the intention of causing "serious emotional distress" could face up to six months in prison and a $1,000 fine.

The anti-revenge porn legislation adds to existing anti-Peeping Tom laws, which make it illegal to secretly take images or videos of people in the buff without their knowledge.

“Until now, there was no tool for law enforcement to protect victims,” said the bill's author, Senator Anthony Cannella, in a statement. “Too many have had their lives upended because of an action of another that they trusted.” ®

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