They were ordinary selfies Charlotte Hooper had taken from the age of 16, but suddenly they were all over an X-rated chat forum. It was the start of a terrifying period of hypervigilance

Charlotte Hooper was in a university lecture when the Facebook message flashed up on her phone. She shot a quick glance at it – there were 10 minutes of class left – and brushed it off. It was from an acquaintance: “Is this you?”, he asked, attaching a link. She assumed it was some kind of scam.

But within seconds, another notification popped up: this time, screenshots of selfies she had taken over the years. “I had a very physical reaction to it – my whole body tensed up. I thought: oh shit, yeah, this is me.”