Image-based abuse and deepfakes in New South Wales.

Is it illegal to send intimate pictures of someone else without consent?

Yes. This is the offence most people mean when they talk about revenge porn or image-based abuse. It is section 91Q of the Crimes Act 1900, and the full text of Division 15C sits on the NSW legislation site. A person commits the offence if they intentionally distribute an intimate image of another person, without that person's consent, and either knowing they did not consent or being reckless about whether they did.

Two of those words carry a wide meaning. Distribute is not limited to publishing something to the world. Under section 91N it covers sending, supplying, showing, transmitting or communicating an image to another person, or making it available for another person to view, by any means. A private message to one friend can be distribution. So can posting to a group chat, uploading to a site, or showing the image on a phone screen. An intimate image is an image of a person's private parts, or of a person engaged in a private act, in circumstances where a reasonable person would expect privacy. A private act includes being undressed, using the toilet, showering or bathing, or a sexual act of a kind not ordinarily done in public.

Are deepfakes illegal in NSW?

Yes, where the deepfake is sexual. This is the part of the law that changed on 16 February 2026, when the Crimes Amendment (Intimate Image and Audio Material) Act 2025 commenced. Before that change, the offences worked on real photographs and on images that had been doctored from a real starting image. The gap was synthetic material: an image built from nothing by software, of a person who never did the thing shown. That gap is now closed.

Section 91PA creates two limbs. The first is altering an image or audio of a real person so that it becomes intimate material, without that person's consent. The second is creating intimate material of a simulated person, without the consent of the real person the material is meant to represent. The definitions do the heavy lifting. Digitally generated, under section 91N, includes images or audio created by generative artificial intelligence. A simulated person is a digital likeness that either expressly purports to be a genuine depiction of an identifiable real person, or so closely resembles one that a reasonable person who knew them would take it to be genuine. The maximum penalty matches the rest of the Division: 100 penalty units or 3 years imprisonment, or both.

The 2025 Act also brought audio into the Division for the first time. Intimate audio material covers audio of a person that is sexual in nature or relates to a private act, whether the audio is genuine, altered, or generated to depict a simulated person. A faked voice recording can now be an offence in the same way as a faked image. The NSW Department of Communities and Justice has published a plain summary of the reforms.

Is it illegal to film someone without their permission in NSW?

Recording is a separate offence from sharing. Section 91P makes it an offence to intentionally record an intimate image of another person without consent, knowing they did not consent or being reckless about it. Recording means capturing the image by any means, and the offence is complete at the point of recording, whether or not the image is ever shown to anyone.

Not all filming is caught. Section 91P turns on two things: the image has to be intimate, and the subject has to have had a reasonable expectation of privacy. Filming a person in a public place, or filming that has nothing sexual or private about it, is not this offence, though it may raise other laws such as the Surveillance Devices Act 2007 or, where the conduct is part of a pattern of harassment, stalking or intimidation. Upskirting and filming into a bathroom or a change room are the clearest examples of what section 91P is aimed at, because the subject plainly expected privacy.

What are the legal consequences of sharing intimate images without consent?

Every offence in Division 15C carries the same maximum: 100 penalty units or 3 years imprisonment, or both. A penalty unit in NSW is 110 dollars, so 100 units is 11,000 dollars. There is no standard non-parole period for these offences, so a court is not working against a fixed reference point the way it does for the most serious assaults. That does not make the charge minor. A conviction for a sexual offence of this kind carries real weight, and the effect on work, travel and reputation is often the sharpest consequence a client feels.

Section 91P, section 91PA, section 91Q and section 91R are Table 2 offences under the Criminal Procedure Act 1986. In practice that means they start and usually finish in the Local Court, and they stay there unless the prosecution elects to take the matter to the District Court. The accused does not get to choose. There is one more power worth knowing. Under section 91S, a court that finds a person guilty can order them to take reasonable steps to remove, retract, delete or destroy the image within a set time. Ignoring that order is itself an offence, carrying up to 2 years. Where the facts are at the lower end and the person has no record, a court can deal with the matter without recording a conviction, through the orders described in our note on conditional release orders and section 10.

Can you go to jail for a social media post in Australia?

You can. Posting an intimate image of a person to social media without consent is distribution under section 91Q, and imprisonment is one of the available penalties. Most first offences at the lower end do not end in a full-time custodial sentence, but the option is there, and the seriousness climbs quickly where the image is spread widely, where it is used to humiliate or control a former partner, or where it forms part of a pattern of abuse.

The same post can also be a Commonwealth offence. Because social media runs over a carriage service, using it to transmit non-consensual sexual material can fall under section 474.17A of the Criminal Code, the aggravated form of the offence dealt with in our note on using a carriage service to menace, harass or cause offence. Police and prosecutors choose which law fits the facts. What matters for anyone facing this is that a single act of posting can attract either a State or a federal charge, and the two schemes overlap.

What if someone has intimate images of you without your consent?

There are two paths, and they run in parallel. The criminal path is a complaint to police, who can charge under Division 15C. The civil path is the scheme run by the eSafety Commissioner under the Online Safety Act 2021 (Cth). The Commissioner can order a platform or a person to take an intimate image down, and can seek penalties in the Federal Court against people who post this material. That civil scheme is separate from any criminal charge, and it does not depend on a criminal conviction. A person affected can use one path, the other, or both.

Section 91R rounds out the criminal picture. It makes it an offence to threaten to record, create, alter or distribute intimate material of a person, where the threat is meant to make them fear it will be carried out. Two points give the section real reach. The threat can be made by any conduct, explicit or implicit, and the material does not even have to exist. And the prosecution does not have to prove that the person threatened actually feared the threat would be carried out. This is the section that answers the sextortion cases, where a demand for money or images is backed by a threat to release a photo.

What counts as consent, and what defences apply?

Consent is defined in section 91O, and it drives every offence in the Division. A person consents if they freely and voluntarily agree, and the section spells out that agreement to one thing is not agreement to another. Consenting to an image being recorded is not consent to it being shared. Consenting to share it with one person, or in one way, is not consent to share it with anyone else or in any other way. And a person who shares an intimate image of themselves has not, by that act alone, consented to anyone else passing it on. The section also lists situations where there is no consent at all: where the person is under 16 or otherwise lacks capacity, where they are asleep or unconscious, or where they agree only because of threats or unlawful detention.

There are real defences. Section 91T sets out exceptions for conduct done for a genuine medical or scientific purpose, by a law enforcement officer for a genuine law enforcement purpose, or as reasonably necessary for legal proceedings. It also provides a broader exception where a reasonable person would consider the accused's conduct acceptable, weighing the nature of the material, the circumstances in which it was dealt with, the age and vulnerability of the person shown, the effect on their privacy, and the relationship between the parties. Beyond those, the ordinary battlegrounds apply: whether the image is intimate at all, whether the person shown had a reasonable expectation of privacy, whether the accused knew there was no consent or was reckless about it, and, in a deepfake case, whether the material identifies a real person at all. Where a person under 16 is charged, no prosecution can begin without the approval of the Director of Public Prosecutions.

How the charge runs, and why early advice matters.

These matters almost always begin with the digital evidence: a phone, a message thread, an account, a download history. Much of the case is built from devices, so what happens in the first days counts. Anyone asked to take part in a police interview should get advice before saying anything, and our note on the recorded police interview explains why the right to silence is worth using. A single account can hold both the answer to a charge and a good deal of context that helps or hurts, so the handling of the phone and the framing of any account are decisions to make with a lawyer, not on the spot.

Because the Division is new and the deepfake provisions are newer still, the arguments in these cases are not yet settled by a body of appeal decisions. That cuts both ways. It gives room to argue the meaning of the elements, and it means the prosecution has to prove each one carefully rather than lean on a line of authority. Where a charge is contested, or where it runs to a sentence, a solicitor and, in a serious matter, a barrister run it together. Our guide to working with counsel sets out how that works. The firm acts for people charged with these offences across New South Wales.

Frequently asked.

Is it illegal to send intimate pictures of someone else without consent?

Yes. Section 91Q of the Crimes Act 1900 makes it an offence to intentionally distribute an intimate image of another person without consent, knowing they did not consent or being reckless about it. Distribute covers sending, posting, showing or making the image available by any means. The maximum is 100 penalty units or 3 years, or both. Consent to one image on one occasion is not consent to any other sharing.

Are deepfakes illegal in NSW?

Yes, where the deepfake is sexual. Since 16 February 2026, section 91PA makes it an offence to alter an image or audio of a person into intimate material, or to create intimate material of a simulated person, without the real person's consent. Digitally generated includes material made by generative artificial intelligence. The maximum is 100 penalty units or 3 years, or both.

What are the legal consequences of sharing intimate images without consent?

Each offence carries a maximum of 100 penalty units or 3 years, or both. A NSW penalty unit is 110 dollars, so 100 units is 11,000 dollars. There is no standard non-parole period. The offences are Table 2 offences, finalised in the Local Court unless the prosecution elects the District Court. A court can also order the image removed under section 91S.

Is it illegal to film someone without their permission in NSW?

It depends. Section 91P makes it an offence to record an intimate image of a person without consent, where a reasonable person would expect privacy. Filming in public, or filming that is not intimate, is not caught by section 91P, though the Surveillance Devices Act 2007 or stalking laws may apply. The test is the expectation of privacy and whether the image is intimate.

Is there a law against deepfakes?

Yes. In NSW, section 91PA targets sexual deepfakes and section 91R covers threats to create or alter them. At the Commonwealth level, section 474.17A of the Criminal Code covers transmitting non-consensual sexual material over a carriage service. The eSafety Commissioner also runs a civil removal and penalty scheme under the Online Safety Act 2021.

Is sexting illegal in NSW?

Sexting between consenting adults is not an offence. Division 15C turns on consent, so images shared with agreement are lawful. It becomes an offence if one person then shares the image more widely without consent. Where a person in the image is under 16, they cannot consent and the child abuse material laws apply instead.

To speak to a criminal defence lawyer, call Aaron Kernaghan on 0421 717 019.

This article is written by Aaron Kernaghan, criminal defence lawyer at Good Legal Lawyers, as at 11 July 2026. It is commentary and reflects the personal opinion of the author only. It is not legal advice, it is not a substitute for advice on your own matter, and it does not purport to be accurate or complete. Any matter referred to may be before the court and any person charged is presumed innocent. For advice on a specific matter, contact Aaron Kernaghan on 0421 717 019 or contact the firm.

More criminal-law commentary by Aaron Kernaghan.

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