Digital Exhibitionism before Minors: Article 185 CP on Webcam, Video Calls and Social Media

So-called digital exhibitionism is the contemporary version of a classic offence: obscene exhibition before minors moved onto the webcam, the video call, live streaming or social media. There is no offence with that name; the facts are brought under Article 185 of the Spanish Criminal Code, but the digital medium introduces decisive particularities when it comes to evidence and authorship. As criminal defence lawyers specialising in digital exhibitionism, we explain what Art. 185 CP punishes in the digital environment, the penalties, the line dividing it from more serious offences and the lines of defence.

What Digital Exhibitionism Is

Article 185 CP punishes anyone who carries out, or causes another person to carry out, acts of obscene exhibition before minors or persons with a disability in need of special protection. The provision does not distinguish by medium: what matters is that the act of obscene exhibition is projected before one of those persons. That is why conduct such as displaying the genitals or performing sexually explicit acts before a minor through the following channels falls within it:

• Webcam or video call in real time, on chats, video platforms or messaging apps.
• Live streaming accessible to minors.
• Sending one's own obscene images or videos to a minor by messaging or social media.
• Targeted publication of that content on profiles or spaces the minor accesses.

The protected legal interest is the sexual indemnity and freedom of the minor or of the person with a disability, whom the law seeks to shield from confronting explicit sexual acts that may disturb their development. The obscene element requires sexually explicit content together with an element of display; not every inappropriate image or instance of nudity satisfies the offence.

Elements of the Offence

For the offence under Art. 185 CP to apply in its digital form, several elements must be present:

• An act of obscene exhibition. Sexually explicit conduct shown or projected, not a mere sexual allusion or a conversation of a sexual tone.
• A protected recipient. A minor or a person with a disability in need of special protection who perceives the act.
• A suitable digital medium. That the channel used (webcam, video call, social media, messaging) actually allows that person to witness the exhibition.
• Intent. The offender knows the obscene nature of the conduct and carries it out willingly before someone they know —or contemplate— to be a minor or a person with a disability.

The subjective element is especially relevant in the digital environment: the defence often turns on whether the accused knew or could have known that there was a minor on the other side of the screen, and on whether there was a genuine intention to expose oneself before that person.

Penalties under Art. 185 CP

Article 185 CP provides for an alternative penalty:

Conduct	Penalty
Obscene exhibition before minors or persons with a disability in need of special protection (Art. 185 CP)	Six months to one year in prison or a fine of twelve to twenty-four months.

This is a less serious offence. The specific penalty within that range depends on the circumstances of the act, on any mitigating or aggravating factors, and above all on the classification the facts ultimately receive. A large part of the procedural strategy lies precisely in preventing an act of exhibition from being read as part of more serious conduct that would carry the penalties of other offences.

The Line with Grooming (Art. 183 CP)

The most important distinction is from the online grooming of minors under Art. 183 CP. The difference lies in the purpose and the structure:

• Digital exhibitionism (Art. 185 CP): the conduct is complete in the obscene exhibition itself before the minor. What is punished is the act of exposing oneself.
• Grooming (Art. 183 CP): requires contact with a minor under sixteen, through information technologies, in order to arrange a meeting for a sexual purpose, accompanied by material acts of approach. The penalty is one to three years in prison or a fine of twelve to twenty-four months, imposed in its upper half where the approach is achieved through coercion, intimidation or deception.

Where digital exhibition is not an end in itself but an instrument within a strategy of sexual approach to the minor, the facts may shift towards Art. 183 CP, with a markedly higher penalty. Correctly classifying the conduct —exhibition complete in itself as against exhibition integrated into a plan of approach— is one of the decisive points in the proceedings.

The Line with Stalking (Art. 172 ter CP) between Adults

Article 185 CP protects minors and persons with a disability in need of special protection. Where the conduct of showing unwanted sexual content is directed between adults and in an insistent and repeated manner, the proper classification is no longer exhibitionism but stalking under Art. 172 ter CP, which punishes with three months to two years in prison or a fine of six to twenty-four months conduct that, without authorisation, is carried out insistently and repeatedly and seriously disrupts the victim's everyday life.

Telling the two scenarios apart is essential: a one-off act of exhibition before someone who turns out to be a minor is not the same as a sustained pattern of unwanted sending to an adult. The defence must place the facts precisely within the correct offence, because the applicable penalty range depends on it.

Electronic Evidence: the Heart of the Case

In digital exhibitionism the electronic evidence is the real battleground. Unlike in-person exhibition, here almost all the evidential material is digital and therefore alterable and volatile. Typically at stake are:

• Screenshots, recordings and chat logs, whose authenticity and integrity must be established: an isolated screenshot, without context or verification, has little value on its own.
• Metadata and connection data: dates, times, devices, sessions, IP addresses and geolocation.
• Forensic analysis of the device from which the conduct allegedly originated, with respect for the safeguards governing how it was obtained.
• The chain of custody of the digital material from the moment it is obtained until it is incorporated into the proceedings.

The lawfulness of how this evidence is obtained is decisive: material gathered in breach of fundamental rights or without the required safeguards may be declared void (Art. 11.1 of the Organic Law on the Judiciary) and drag derivative evidence down with it. For that reason, a very significant part of the defence consists in examining how each digital item was obtained, preserved and produced.

The Problem of Authorship

The second major front is material authorship. In the digital environment, identifying who carried out the act is more complex than it appears:

• An IP address identifies a connection, not a person; on shared or household networks several users may be involved.
• An account or profile may be shared, impersonated, hacked or accessed from several devices.
• Ownership of the line or of the terminal does not, without more, mean having been the person in front of the camera at the relevant time.

Establishing authorship requires evidential work going beyond mere ownership: analysis of the device, sessions, usage patterns and the body of circumstantial evidence. The settled case law of the Supreme Court is demanding when it comes to proof of authorship in the digital sphere, and the presumption of innocence prevents conviction on the basis of fragile inferences. Challenging authorship is therefore one of the most important lines of defence.

Lines of Defence

There is no single defence: each case dictates its strategy according to the facts and the available evidence. Always within respect for the presumption of innocence, the most common lines are:

• Challenging the electronic evidence: the lawfulness of how it was obtained, the chain of custody, the integrity of screenshots and logs, and verification of metadata.
• Questioning authorship: the effective identification of who carried out the act, as against the mere ownership of the IP address, the account or the device.
• Knowledge that the recipient was a minor: analysing whether the accused knew or could have known that the recipient was a minor or a person with a disability, a key element of intent.
• Correct classification of the facts: preventing an undue shift towards grooming under Art. 183 CP or other more serious offences where the elements are not present.
• Lack of the obscene element or absence of effective projection of the act before the protected person.

Early legal involvement is decisive: digital evidence is volatile, and the first decisions —from the statement to the preservation of the material— shape the entire proceedings.

Contact the Firm

Alonso Sala is a firm dedicated exclusively to criminal law, based at calle Velázquez 27 in Madrid and with coverage throughout Spain. We assess whether the facts amount to digital exhibitionism under Art. 185 CP, how it is distinguished from grooming under Art. 183 CP and from stalking under Art. 172 ter CP, and we take on the defence with a rigorous examination of the electronic evidence and of authorship, always with the utmost discretion and an individualised study of the case.