In Lawrence v. Texas, 2003, the Supreme Court struck down a law that made certain consensual sex acts, especially gay sexual acts, illegal. In doing so, it said that the Constitution prevents the government from regulating what consenting adults do sexually within the home.

Consequently, lawyers have advised clients that “home movies” are legal to make and market on the Internet, and these are quickly becoming a cottage industry.

The latest craze in such home movies is the so-called “pay-per-minute model.” In these, we find folks who will do just about anything in front of a camera so long as the customer pays an agreed sum per minute.

(I suppose the good news for Congress is that a lot of college-age men and women have found a new revenue source to pay for college.)

California law allows individuals to solicit other consenting adults to perform sexual activity in front of a camera. Courts have held that this is not prostitution, so laws against soliciting don’t apply. The key, say the courts, is that the director and the models/performers don’t touch. (Think phone sex but with pictures.)

Home filmmakers are constrained by other laws, however. California law grants every person “publicity” rights. Just as it’s illegal to steal a person’s identity, anyone who films someone and distributes the photos publicly via the Internet has to obtain consent, pay for the use or face a court order restraining the use. (It’s all spelled out in the California Civil Code, section 3344.) Federal law has comparable rules, and those apply to the Internet. In general, the filmmaker and the distributor are both liable for infringement on copyright and publicity rights. And just as major players such as YouTube are being sued for copyright infringement, home moviemakers and the Web sites that distribute their videos are subject to civil and criminal sanctions for infringing publicity laws.

I mention this because one Web site features both gay and straight folks sharing their “home” videos. Some of the gay users are San Diegans and feature films starring other San Diegans. There is not a problem with this, of course, provided the moviemaker got consent to make the film and to distribute it via the Internet. If not, there can be some serious consequences.

For starters, as I explained in last week’s column, it is a crime to make a video image of someone in an area where they have a reasonable expectation of privacy. Then, of course, there are the civil matters involving invasion of privacy, publicity rights and copyright matters.

Federal law also requires moviemakers and distributors to maintain records of the identities and ages of the participants in these movies.

In future, Congress will need to identify how Web sites verify that the persons depicted in their films consented to being filmed and to having those films “broadcast” on the Internet.

Victims of such “privacy” theft should notify law enforcement. Federal law requires the site to remove the material, and a judge will issue an order to obtain the identity of the person who has done the posting. Of course, sometimes you have no idea whether your image has been posted on the Internet or not. Soon, however, new technology will enable you to Google your image and see if it is posted on any Web sites.