Yes. Since September 18, 2024, sharing someone’s nude, partially nude, or sexually explicit images without their consent, often called revenge porn, is a crime in Massachusetts. The same law also covers AI-generated “deepfakes.” If you have wondered whether revenge porn is a crime in Massachusetts, the answer changed with the Act to Prevent Abuse and Exploitation, the bill Governor Healey signed in June 2024. The law folded this conduct into the state’s criminal harassment statute, General Laws chapter 265, section 43A. A first offense carries up to two and a half years in a house of correction and a fine of up to $10,000.
This post explains what the law actually prohibits, what it does not, the penalties, and the defenses that matter most.
What the New Law Makes Illegal
The law targets one core act: knowingly distributing intimate images of another person without their consent. To convict someone, the Commonwealth has to prove several things.
- First, the person knowingly shared visual material — a photo, video, or digital image — by any means, including posting, texting, emailing, or uploading it.
- Second, the material shows a real person who is identifiable and who is nude, partially nude, or engaged in sexual conduct.
- Third, the sharing caused that person physical harm, economic harm, or substantial emotional distress.
- Fourth, the person shared it either intending to harm, harass, intimidate, threaten, or coerce the victim, or with reckless disregard for the harm, for the victim’s lack of consent, and for the victim’s reasonable expectation that the images would stay private.
Because the offense sits inside the criminal harassment statute, a conviction counts as criminal harassment. The law also lets a victim ask a court to order the images removed and to stop any further sharing.
Is It Illegal To Make a Deepfake in Massachusetts?
This is where people get the law wrong. The Massachusetts statute punishes distributing a sexual deepfake, not merely making one. The law defines “digitization” broadly — creating or altering an image, including through computer-generated or AI tools, so that it would look authentic to a reasonable person.
But the crime is knowingly sharing that fabricated image of a real, identifiable person without consent, with the same harm and intent requirements described above. So the accurate answer to whether it is illegal to make a deepfake in Massachusetts is this: creating a sexual deepfake you never share generally falls outside this particular statute, while distributing one can land you in a house of correction.
Two cautions. If a deepfake depicts a child, separate and far more serious child-exploitation laws apply. And even where this statute does not reach the conduct, other criminal laws or a civil lawsuit still might.
The Penalties For Revenge Porn
A first offense is a misdemeanor punishable by up to two and a half years in a house of correction, a fine of up to $10,000, or both. A second or later offense — or an offense committed by someone already convicted of stalking — is far more serious: up to ten years in state prison, a fine of up to $15,000, or both. That repeat-offense exposure turns the charge into a felony. The law also keeps any images in the court file sealed from public inspection.
The consequences reach past any sentence. A conviction creates a criminal record that can surface on background checks and affect jobs, housing, and professional licenses. For anyone who is not a U.S. citizen, a charge like this should be reviewed for immigration consequences before making any decision about how to resolve it.
The Defenses That Matter Most
A charge is not a conviction, and several real defenses apply to these cases.
- Consent. Consent is often misunderstood here. Agreeing to let someone take a photo is not the same as agreeing to let them share it — the statute says so directly. The real question is whether the person agreed to the distribution. And the law protects other people’s images, not your own: sharing intimate images of yourself is not covered.
- Identity. The person in the image has to be identifiable, either from the image itself or from information shared along with it. An image with no visible face and no identifying details, shared without anything that points to a specific person, may not meet this requirement.
- Intent and knowledge. The Commonwealth must prove the sharing was knowing, and that it came with intent to harm or with reckless disregard for the harm and the lack of consent. A genuinely accidental disclosure, or a real and reasonable belief that the person had agreed to the sharing, can undercut the case.
- First Amendment limits. These laws have to coexist with free speech, so the statute carves out protected categories: images that are a matter of public concern, distribution in the public interest such as reporting unlawful conduct, images from commercial settings or places where no one has a reasonable expectation of privacy, and content that online platforms merely host for other people. Those carve-outs are where the hard cases live. The statute is written narrowly to punish private, nonconsensual, harmful sharing rather than protected expression.
- Timing. The law does not reach conduct that occurred before September 18, 2024. If the alleged sharing predates that date, it cannot be charged under this statute.
A Threat To Share Images Can Be a Crime Too
The same Act expanded the definition of abuse to include coercive control, which covers threatening to release someone’s intimate images. A person who says “I will post your photos unless you do what I want” can become the subject of an abuse prevention order based on the threat alone — before any image is ever shared.
The Federal TAKE IT DOWN Act is a Separate Law
Do not confuse the Massachusetts statute with the federal TAKE IT DOWN Act, signed into federal law in May 2025. It is a different law. It creates parallel federal criminal liability for sharing nonconsensual intimate images, including deepfakes, through online platforms, and it requires those platforms to remove reported images within 48 hours. Someone who posts images online can face both the Massachusetts charge and a separate federal charge for the same conduct, with penalties stacked on top of one another.
Minors Are Handled Differently
The Act also created a separate track for teenagers. Rather than exposing minors who share explicit images to the harshest criminal penalties, it set up a diversion and education program and allows minors accused of sharing nude images of other minors to be handled in Juvenile Court under a different statute. This teen track is not the same as the adult offense described above, and the two should not be mixed up.
What To Do if You Have Been Accused?
Many of these cases do not begin with an arrest. They begin with a summons to a clerk-magistrate hearing weeks later — an early and often overlooked chance to keep a charge from being formally issued and off your record. If you learn you are under investigation or you receive a summons, talk to a lawyer before you do anything else. Do not contact the person who made the complaint. Do not delete accounts, messages, or devices; deleting things can look like an attempt to hide evidence and can destroy the forensic proof that would actually help your defense.
Talk to a Massachusetts Criminal Defense Attorney
If you have been accused of sharing intimate images or a deepfake, or you have received a summons to a clerk-magistrate hearing, the stakes are serious and early decisions matter. An experienced Boston criminal defense attorney can help you understand the allegations, prepare for the hearing, and protect your rights from the outset. The Law Office of Matthew W. Peterson offers free consultations for criminal cases. Call or text 617-295-7500, or send us a message below.
