Italy’s Meloni slams photo sharing in lewd sites scandal

Italy's Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni speaks at the Rimini Meeting in Rimini, Italy, Wednesday, Aug. 27, 2025. (Davide Gennari/LaPresse via AP)

Warning: This story contains graphic details.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni on Friday urged women to immediately report intimate photographs shared online without their consent, after it emerged that even the premier herself had been targeted.

“I am disgusted by what has happened”, Meloni told the Corriere della Sera daily, after doctored photos of a series of high-profile women -- including Meloni and opposition leader Elly Schlein -- were discovered on a pornographic website.

The images, ranging from photographs at political rallies to holiday snaps stolen from personal social media accounts, had been altered to highlight or sexualize body parts.

The platform, called Phica -- a play on a slang term for vagina in Italian -- had more than 700,000 subscribers before it closed on Thursday, blaming users for breaking its rules.

That followed the discovery last week of a now-shuttered Italian Facebook group called “My Wife”, where men posted photos of their wives and made vulgar, sexist and violent comments.

“I want to extend my solidarity and support to all the women who have been offended, insulted and violated,” Meloni said.

Italian police told AFP they had received “many” reports about these and other sites posting lewd or doctored images without consent.

Valeria Campagna, a leading member of the centre-left Democratic Party (PD) in the Lazio region, told AFP she was “immediately angry, disgusted” at discovering nearly 18 months of photographs of her on the site, but added “I wasn’t surprised.”

The 28-year-old blamed the “systemic phenomenon” on “a patriarchal culture for which women are objects over which to exercise rights of possession, control, and power.”

‘Rape culture’

Meloni, the first woman to become Italy’s prime minister, said those responsible must be identified and punished “with the utmost firmness” as quickly as possible.

“Content that is considered harmless can, in the wrong hands, become a terrible weapon. And we must all be aware of this,” she said.

“The best defence available to protect ourselves and those around us” is to “immediately report” such crimes, she told victims.

Schlein said the posts were part of a “rape culture” which was not only “normalized and justified online”, but “incited by providing specific outlets for the venting of the worst impulses.”

Phica had existed since 2005 and remained open despite numerous reports lodged over the years with the police, according to the Post online newspaper.

The newspaper said the site organized “cum tributes”, with men posting proof of masturbation over photographs of fellow users’ wives or girlfriends.

One victim, Mary Galati, said she discovered she was on it in 2023 and used her father’s identity documents to sign up, as the site would only accept male users.

The site was “hell”, the Post quoted her as saying, with “husbands sharing photos of their wives (and) men exposing their partners or relatives. Even fathers uploading photos of their very young daughters -- four or five-year-old girls -- being sexualized.”

Italian Equality Minister Eugenia Roccella said the government was working on cultural reforms, while women’s rights advocates announced a potential class action.

As well as educating young people in respect and consent, “we ask young people, particularly men, to take action in their own small way, starting with their own family and friends, starting with their own social and work contexts,” Campagna said.

“By not reproducing or repeating these attitudes, but also by not remaining silent when these sexist attitudes, comments, ‘jokes’ are made”, she said.