First criminal “revenge porn” case involving messaging app Line emerges in Japan

Even as discourse over how best to eliminate revenge porn grows overseas, the first criminal case involving the messaging app Line has emerged in Japan. Police have arrested two men for sharing topless images of a woman in her 20s without her permission in April.

According to various news sources in Japan, two men, Kazuki Uchikawa (27) and Takuma Takakubo (26), have been arrested for sharing topless images of an unnamed woman in her 20s via Line, the free messaging app that has taken the nation by storm in the past few years.

▼ Video of Uchikawa during police transport

The woman had apparently joined a Line talk group (basically a shared messaging group) with Takakubo and several gamer friends after meeting him through a social networking site. Takakubo took the photos of the woman while she was changing and shared them on the talk group. He was apparently angry at the woman losing a souvenir he had bought for her while overseas.

Uchikawa then shared the photos with three other talk groups. He confessed to the crime, telling police, “I thought it would get them excited.”

It’s unclear exactly how many people the photos were shared with, though NHK has indicated that it was approximately 60 people. According to police this is the first criminal “revenge porn” case in Japan involving Line, though not the first “revenge porn” case. Japan passed anti-revenge porn legislation in November last year, and numerous cases have already emerged. The maximum punishment for posting “revenge porn” in Japan is a prison sentence of three years.

Line is a popular and free messaging app with a large user base in Japan. Several incidents involving the app, including bullying, dating scams and even murder, have occurred in the past few years.

SoraNews24 —Japan News—