On ABEMA TV: Sextortion and the Need for Legal Reform
- Apr 28
- 2 min read
On April 27, 2026, PAPS's Eri Uchida appeared on an ABEMA TV program to talk about the sharp rise in sextortion.
The program covered sextortion in which money is demanded on the basis of sexual images or videos, sextortion in which former partners and others use images to control the victim, and the problem of sexual deepfakes.
PAPS, too, is seeing a surge in consultations from children and young people under 18.
Sextortion perpetrators exploit victims' fear. They threaten—"pay now or I'll spread it", "I'll send it to your followers"—robbing victims of time to think and pressing them to pay. Suddenly, one's sexual images are held hostage, amid the terror that family, friends, school, or workplace might find out. Being driven into a state where calm judgment is impossible is not the victim's failing. It is the perpetrator preying on fear and isolation.
PAPS has long received consultations from those harmed, supported takedown requests for images and videos that have spread, and continued public communication to prevent harm involving sexual images. All of this work is essential to keeping victims from being isolated.
What emerges from this frontline work are the areas the current system fails to adequately address.
One example is sextortion by perpetrators located overseas. Even when a victim in Japan is being threatened and money is demanded, if the perpetrator is outside the country, current law sometimes cannot adequately hold them to account. The Penal Code includes the crimes of intimidation and extortion, but Japanese law cannot always reach perpetrators abroad who are not Japanese nationals. We need mechanisms that can respond effectively to those who target and threaten Japan's children and young people from overseas.
With sexual deepfakes as well, the legal system has not caught up with the reality of the harm. Even if a person never sent a sexual image, sexual images that appear to be of them can be created from yearbook photos or pictures on social media and then shared. We need laws that clearly regulate synthetic sexual images that a third party would recognize as depicting the person. The harm is especially severe when children's images are abused.
The harm of digital sexual violence does not necessarily end once content is deleted. Images and videos are copied, saved, and shared again elsewhere. That is why—alongside expanding places to turn to and pathways to takedowns—it is crucial to clearly define creating, threatening, and spreading as acts of abuse.
Law is not only for punishing. It is also how society clearly declares "this is abuse", building a foundation so that victims do not have to carry everything alone. On sextortion and sexual deepfakes, what is missing now is not more words demanding that victims take precautions, but clear lines for holding perpetrators accountable.
So that sextortion and sexual deepfakes are not treated as matters of personal caution or self-responsibility. So that we build social systems that do not isolate victims and do not tolerate abuse.
PAPS will continue frontline counseling and public communication while calling for legal reform. We hope you will help us spread awareness of this issue.
