This book explores the policing response to teen sexting – the digital exchange, both consensual and non-consensual, of intimate images among youth peers. With a particular focus in England and Wales, it also considers other international responses and the challenges faced in policing youth practices with legislation being applied beyond its intended scope. It uses the police responses in England and Wales as a case study of the challenges of policy evolving the digital cultural phenomenon and the tensions between enforcing the law, while knowing it’s not fit for purpose, and supporting vulnerable minors. It explores the policy responses that have developed from the problematic legislation and whether these policy interventions have helped or hindered the policing process. It draws in parallels with drugs policy and policing, and brings in progressive, harm reduction approaches in contrast to traditional solutions.

"The digital transmission of words and images is immediate and unbounded. This creates new freedoms but also new risks. In this important review of 'where we are', Phippen and Bond set out principles for harm reduction, weigh the balance of rights and law, and remind us that they shouldn't have had to write this book! This is a major contribution to work on safeguarding, sexting and victimization." -Nigel South, Emeritus Professor of Sociology, University of Essex, UK This book explores the policing response to teen sexting - the digital exchange, both consensual and non-consensual, of intimate images among youth peers. With a particular focus in England and Wales, it also considers other international responses and the challenges faced in policing youth practices with legislation being applied beyond its intended scope. It uses the police responses in England and Wales as a case study of the challenges of policy evolving the digital cultural phenomenon and the tensions between enforcing the law, while knowing it's not fit for purpose, and supporting vulnerable minors. It explores the policy responses that have developed from the problematic legislation and whether these policy interventions have helped or hindered the policing process. It draws in parallels with drugs policy and policing, and brings in progressive, harm reduction approaches in contrast to traditional solutions. Andy Phippen is Professor of Digital Rights at Bournemouth University, UK. Emma Bond is Pro-vice Chancellor (Research) and Professor of Sociotechnical Studies at the University of Suffolk, UK.

This collection focuses attention on an important but academically neglected area of contemporary operational policing: the regulation of consensual sexual practices. Despite the high-level public visibility of, and debate about, policing in relation to violent and abusive sexual crimes (from child sexual abuse to adult rape) very little public or scholarly attention is paid to the policing of consensual sexual practices in contemporary societies. Whilst ‘sexual life’ is commonly understood to be a matter of ‘private life’ that is beyond formal social control, this book shows that policing is implicated in the regulation of a wide range of consensual sexual practices. This book brings together a well known and respected group of academics, from a range of disciplines, to explore the role of the police in shaping the boundaries of that aspect of our lives that we imagine to be most intimate and most our own. The volume presents a ‘snap shot’ of policing in respect of a number of diverse areas – such as public sex, pornography, and sex work – and considers how sexual orientation structures police responses to them. The authors critically examine how policing is implicated in the social, moral and political landscape of sex and, contrary to the established rhetoric of politicians and criminal justice practitioners, continues to intervene in the private lives of citizens. It is essential supplementary reading for courses in criminology, law, policing, sociology of deviance, gender and sexuality, and cultural studies.

Technology has made so many things possible, including sending romantic messages to someone else via text. Sexting is just a new form of communication that continues to serve our need to tell one another things, but sometimes this can go horribly wrong, especially being of a sexual nature. This book debates the issue of sexting, touching on such topics as the rise of sexting among teens and adults, if it is hurtful to teens, and whether or not sexting is a criminal offense.

This book explores young people's practices and perceptions of sexting and how sexting has been represented and responded to by the media, education campaigns, and the law. It analyses the important broader socio-legal issues raised by sexting and the appropriateness of current responses.

Sexting Panic illustrates how anxieties about technology and teen girls' sexuality distract from critical questions about how to adapt norms of privacy and consent for new media. Though mobile phones can be used to cause harm, Amy Adele Hasinoff notes that criminalization and abstinence policies meant to curb sexting often fail to account for the distinction between consensual sharing and the malicious distribution of a private image. Hasinoff challenges the idea that sexting inevitably victimizes young women. Instead, she encourages us to recognize young people's capacity for choice and recommends responses to sexting that are realistic and nuanced rather than based on misplaced fears about deviance, sexuality, and digital media.

Chapter “Predictive Policing in 2025: A Scenario” is available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com.