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In April 2026, Azerbaijan’s National Assembly criminalised AI-generated sexual deepfakes created or shared without consent. The reform recognised digital sexual abuse as a serious crime. Cyberflashing should now be next.
In April 2026, Azerbaijan’s National Assembly approved an important amendment to the Criminal Code. Creating or distributing AI-generated pornographic or sexually explicit material using someone’s likeness or voice without consent can now lead to criminal liability, including imprisonment for between three and seven years. It was a rare, forward-looking move. It showed that lawmakers understand a simple truth: image-based sexual abuse is real, digital and growing.
But there is a more common form of the same abuse that Azerbaijani law still does not clearly recognise: cyberflashing.
Cyberflashing is the act of sending someone an unsolicited sexual image, often through AirDrop, Bluetooth, WhatsApp, Telegram, Instagram or another digital platform, without warning or consent. The recipient has no meaningful opportunity to refuse it in advance. The screen becomes the place of violation.
Picture a woman on the Baku Metro, or waiting for a bus, when her phone receives a nearby file-sharing request. She accepts, thinking it may be from a friend, and an explicit image appears on her screen. She does not know who sent it. She does not know whether the sender is standing next to her, watching her reaction, or whether he selected her from a list of nearby devices. Should she get off the train? Is she safe to walk home?
There is rarely a way to answer these questions. There is also rarely a way to identify the sender.
That is the harm. It is not only shock. It is fear, humiliation and a loss of control. The fact that the act happens through a screen does not make it minor. For many victims, it can feel even more invasive because it turns an everyday device into a channel for unwanted sexual exposure.
Cyberflashing also changes how people move through public spaces. A phone that should connect them to the world becomes another point of vulnerability. The abuse may last only seconds, but the anxiety can remain.
International research suggests this is not a niche problem. U.K. polling and platform research among young adults has found high levels of unsolicited sexual image-sharing, particularly affecting young women. Studies involving teenagers have also shown that many girls receive unwanted sexual images and often do not report them to parents, schools, platforms or authorities because they assume nothing will be done.
There is no reason to believe Azerbaijan is immune to this pattern. If anything, the absence of public reporting mechanisms, legal definitions and awareness may mean the true scale of the problem is invisible rather than small.
Azerbaijan is not without relevant legal tools. The Constitution protects private life. The Criminal Code contains provisions covering privacy violations, personal data, pornographic material and, now, AI-generated sexual content using a person’s likeness or voice without consent.
But these provisions largely focus on material that is taken, created, stored, distributed or made public without consent. Cyberflashing is different. The image may not depict the victim at all. The violation is not that the victim’s image was stolen. The violation is that sexual content was forced onto the victim’s screen without consent.
That distinction matters. Azerbaijani law can punish certain forms of non-consensual image abuse. But it does not clearly address the act of forcing someone to receive an unwanted sexual image in the first place.
This is the legal gap.
Britain offers a useful cautionary example. The U.K. created a cyberflashing offence under the Online Safety Act 2023. That was an important step. But campaigners warned that the law relied too heavily on proving the sender’s intention: whether the sender intended to cause alarm, distress or humiliation, or acted for sexual gratification.
That can be difficult to prove, especially when the sender is a stranger. A consent-based approach would be simpler and stronger. It would ask the central question first: did the recipient agree to receive this sexual image?
Azerbaijan should learn from that. The country does not need to copy another jurisdiction’s mistakes. It can build a better offence from the outset.
Azerbaijan has just shown, through its AI sexual deepfake amendment, that it is willing to update criminal law for the realities of digital life. Cyberflashing belongs to the same legal family. It is image-based sexual abuse. It is non-consensual. It is digital. And it currently sits in a legal grey area.
Closing that gap would not require reinventing the law. It would require extending the same logic already applied to AI-generated sexual material: a person's right to control sexual content involving or directed at them does not disappear because the abuse happens on a phone.
The offence should be built around consent, not only intent. It should cover the intentional sending of, or causing another person to see, a sexual image without that person's agreement. It should include digital platforms, messaging apps, Bluetooth-based sharing and proximity-based file transfer systems. It should also make reporting straightforward, accessible and safe.
As more of Azerbaijani life - work, relationships, shopping, protest, friendship and public debate - moves onto phones and apps, the law cannot treat the digital world as a lesser jurisdiction than the street.
If flashing someone in public is a violation, forcing the same exposure onto their screen should not be treated as harmless.
Azerbaijan has already taken one step against AI-enabled sexual abuse. Cyberflashing should be next.
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