For survivors of abuse and stalking

What you are up against

• Photos posted to shame or to locate you. Images shared on forums, fake profiles or classified sites, sometimes with your name, workplace or area attached.
• Fake accounts in your name. Profiles that use your face to contact your friends, your employer or new people in your life.
• Not knowing. The fear that something is out there, without a way to check that does not involve the person who did it.

Searching safely

• A search is private. Nothing is posted anywhere, nobody is notified, and the owner of a page in your results does not learn that you searched.
• No account is needed for the first search. If you share a device with the person, searching without an account leaves no history on it. Signed in, you can delete any saved scan from your history at any time.
• Use a safe device. If there is any chance your phone is monitored or has tracking software, search from a device they have never had access to.
• Search your own face only. Searching the person who harmed you is against our rules and, more importantly, can put you in contact with them or their pages. Leave identifying them to the police and your advocate.

Three workflows

1. 1

   Find where your photos were posted

   Upload a clear photo of your face. Results show public pages where a matching face appears, with the page each one came from. Run it with a recent photo and, if the photos they have are older, one from that time. The find my photos guide has the full routine.

2. 2

   Document and report

   Save screenshots of each page with its URL and date before anything changes. Report fake accounts through each platform's impersonation form (the report guide links them) and give your advocate or the police the same evidence. The fake account guide covers the order of steps.

3. 3

   Get it removed

   Intimate images: StopNCII and the platform's non-consensual image report, as the intimate image abuse page explains. Ordinary photos: the takedown guide. Your face can also be hidden from FaceSearch results, free, through Remove my photos.

Which plan fits

Rules that apply to you

• Search your own face, or the face of someone who has asked you to help them and consented.
• Do not search for the person who harmed you. It is against the acceptable use rules and it is not how they get found; that is police work.
• Do not contact people whose pages appear in your results. Report through the platform or your advocate instead.
• Share results only with the police, your advocate, your lawyer or a helpline.

After the search

Whatever you found, pass it to someone who can act on it with you: an advocate from one of the organisations above, a lawyer, or the police. Keep the evidence in one place you control. If the search found nothing, that is a good sign for today, not a verdict; check again on your own schedule, from a safe device, and spend the rest of your energy on the plan your advocate helps you build.