Penal Law § 250.71 · Article 250. Offenses Against the Right to Privacy
Unlawful dissemination of a personal image
Text — Law content up to date as of October 23, 2026, as published by the New York State Senate (Open Legislation)
§ 250.71 Unlawful dissemination of a personal image.
A person is guilty of unlawful dissemination of a personal image when, with the intent of degrading or abusing a person who has been the victim of a crime described in title H of this part, or otherwise causing harm to the emotional, financial or physical welfare of such victim or such victim's family, the person intentionally:
1. (a) creates and disseminates or publishes a still or video image of such victim on a social media platform, without the victim's consent, in a manner that has no or minimal cultural or social value;
(b) the victim is identifiable from the still or video image itself or from information displayed in connection with the still or video image;
(c) the victim suffered physical injury as a result of a sex offense as defined by article one hundred thirty of this part, serious physical injury as a result of any non-sex offense, or death, and this injury or death is depicted in the image; and
(d) the actor committed, participated in the commission of, or conspired to commit the crime that resulted in such injury to such victim; or
2. acting as an agent of the actor who created an image in violation of subdivision one of this section, he or she knowingly disseminates or publishes such image.
Unlawful dissemination of a personal image in the second degree is a class A misdemeanor.
Source of truth
- Edition
- Law content up to date as of October 23, 2026, as published by the New York State Senate (Open Legislation)
- Official file
- https://legislation.nysenate.gov/pdf/laws/PEN250.71
- Text hash
- sha256 1b553826cc8719f92834e3d058ab8380b5c52893555bba41db50b0fc2bce9a36
- Composed by
- gen_ny_statutes.py 2026-11-10: the Senate's Open Legislation law tree (GET /api/3/laws/<ID>?full=true) read in document order; the Senate's PDF of the whole law (GET /pdf/laws/<ID>?full=true), read with PDFium, prints the same words in the same order
Procedural information only. Not legal advice and not a substitute for the advice of an attorney. Confirm the current text with the official publisher before relying on it.